>> we did. what a sign of our times, that this debate is our third story, ironically. the democratic race more relevant as ever, as trump gets more vulnerable than ever, but getting less attention because of the disruptions and dangerings dangers in people's lives. we saw biden establishing himself as the dominant person. when he hustled on to the stage last night, and there is a great picture of this, he threw the first elbow. bernie sauntered on to the stage. that set the tone for the debate. joe biden controlled it. between the lines, this was fascinating, bernie sanders indicated that he is worried that his people will not warm to joe biden. he continued to try to push biden left a little bit, to try to get some attention for progressive policies. here's what's important. he made it clear that if it came to it, and it looks like it is going to come to it, that he would be more supportive of biden than he was of hillary

clinton back in 2016. that is an encouraging sign for democrats. and this sign of the times, what's happening today, joe biden is doing a tele town hall with the states voting tomorrow. bernie sanders is doing a virtual rally. >> mike allen, live in d.c., thanks for the update. >> thank you for your coverage. >> we'll be reading axios a.m. in a little bit. sign up at signup.axios.com. that does it for us. "morning joe" starts right now. would you prefer a 14-day, just sort of national shutdown to slow this thing? >> i would prefer as much as we possibly could. i think we should really be overly aggressive and get criticized for overreacting. >> should more americans be prepared to be hunkering down at their house? >> i think americans should be prepared that they're going to have to hunker down a significantly more than we as a country are doing. >> the top infectious diseases doctor in the country, dr.

anthony fauci, with that warning yesterday on "meet the press." good morning. welcome to "morning joe." we begin this morning where we will most likely begin for some time to come. the many fast-moving developments with the coronavirus, changing public life as we know it. here's where things stand right now. the u.s. is under a national state of emergency, and the cdc has now updated its guidance, urging against any gatherings of 50 people or more in the next eight weeks. stock futures are once again sliding despite emergency action from the federal reserve, slashing interest rates to zero. the senate is now poised to take up a sweeping bill, passed by the house, that includes free testing, extended sick leave, and $1 billion in food aid. meanwhile, several states and cities across the nation have shut down restaurants and bars to sit-in guests. california, illinois, and new york city among them.

the city of new york also announced last night that it is closing schools, nightclubs, movie theaters, and other entertainment venues. the state of new york is now considering whether to join two other states, georgia and louisiana, in postponing their primary elections. the governor of california has called on more than 5 million senior citizens in his state, and those with underlying health conditions, to isolate themselves. this as the number of confirmed cases continues to surge. now closing in on 3 rksz,500. florida saw a huge spike this weekend, and west virginia remains the only state without a confirmed case. and this was the result of the trump administration's hastily arranged airport screenings for travelers from europe. scores of people crammed together -- >> that is a nightmare. >> -- in the types of crowds we've been told to avoid. that brings us to europe. the uk and ireland were added to

the president's travel ban over the weekend. italy, spain, and france recorded their highest death tolls for a single day. france, 29. spain, 97. italy, a staggering 368 deaths. italy also recorded its most number of new cases in a day, 3,590. spain and france have now joined italy in banning people from leaving their homes for non-essential purposes. with us, we have white house reporter for the "associated press," jonathan lemire. washington anchor for bbc world news america. and associated editor for the "washington post" david ignat s ignatius. editor from the "times" also joins us. >> there continues to be a disconnect, david ig ignatius.

actually, let me go to jonathan lemire, white house reporter. there is a disconnect between what we're hearing from the scientists and what the president of the united states is saying. from the beginning, the president was saying it was only a handful of people, 14, maybe 15, who would be down to zero in a week. the cdc was expressing real concern at the same time. the president talked about the coronavirus going away in april magically when things got warmer. he said it was going to go away magically and disappear, while his scientists were again warning americans. yesterday, the president of the united states was saying it is all under control, while his scientists are all saying the same thing, it is going to get worse. we don't know how bad it is going to get. you even had some irresponsible members of congress, remarkably enough, republicans, of course. i have to say that, sadly as a former member, saying, oh, go out to your restaurants. >> good lord.

>> devin nunes said, go out to pubs. that is the worst actual advice i've heard since a monologue was put on a certain network, suggesting that this was all a great hoax to take down the president of the united states. so you have the cdc doctors, scientists, experts from across the world saying one thing, and then you have the president of the united states completely disconnected from his own staff, saying quite another. what's going on inside of the white house? talk about the battle, actually, for the heart and soul, not of the country, but of this administration. >> life has changed in america, and the president doesn't want to admit it, joe. that's where we are right now. he has -- it is one thing for a commander in chief, for the executive of the united states, to preach calm, to be reassuring. that's okay. that's part of the job. but it is very different right now for the president, who seems to have, at least publicly, his head in the sand as to what is

happening. friday, after declaring the national security, which was a step that was needed, he was urged to do by members of both parties, including some of his closest advisers, he reluctantly got there because he was afraid it'd send a bad signal to the markets, acknowledging the severity of the crisis. when he did it, the markets responded well friday. he took a victory lap on twitter about it. over the weekend, he appeared in the briefing room twice. once saturday and once sunday. saturday, wearing a campaign hat, suggesting this is all going to be over soon. that americans, again, stay calm. that's the right thing to stay. but to not acknowledge the severity of the crisis is very different. within the whoite house, we've had a couple of different factions. there is a growing sense of top advisers, including vice president pence, fauci, and others, to be more candid about where things are going. acknowledge to the american people that things are going to get worse before they get better. others, including jared kushner and stephen miller, are focused more on propping up the markets, to downplay the severity of the

incident, the spread of the virus. even though, of course, we are seeing cases tick up day after day. the president and vice president urged americans not to make runs on grocery stores, just buy for the week ahead. and last night, the cdc, against the backdrop of the democratic debate, suggests that americans should, for the next eight weeks, should avoid gatherings of 50 or more. >> right. but -- >> it is changing american life. >> it will change american life, but there's not a scientist, there's not a doctor. i mean, i'm reading conservatives who have apologized for donald trump for three and a half years, when there was nothing left to defend, who are actually saying, this is serious. listen to the scientists. i mean, i'm seeing it on blog posts from pro-trump people. i'm seeing it everywhere. yet, the president of the united states, david ignatius, is still saying, we have this completely under control.

it's going to be okay. things are going to disappear. da david, here's the impact of it, okay? you can have dr. fauci and every other great scientist going out, telling people the truth. but you have -- i'm still getting emails from friends of mine who support donald trump. they're saying how the president says this is overblown. i can still go about my daily life. you see pictures from disney world last night, just shocking pictures from disney world, with thousands and thousands of people crammed together. >> i thought it was closed. >> packed like sardines on main street in disney world. you sit there thinking, i mean, just how many people there had the coronavirus and don't know about it. how many were they spread to? how many seniors are now going to die in the state of florida and across the nation because

people that would go last night say, the president says it is not a big deal. the president says it is not a big deal, then he gets his scientists telling us how serious this is going to be. people just listen to the president. he's still responsible for this chaos going on. why can't he listen to his own scientists? >> you know, joe, that's part of the mystery of donald trump. he lacks the self-confidence, the self-knowledge, the wisdom, perhaps, to listen to those who really are experts. i find it a little chilling just to watch all of those experts, the key people we're depending on, crammed up on a podium behind the president, because he wants that show. they're all -- there's not much social distance there. i wish they'd give each other a little more space. i don't want anybody too near dr. fauci. this period we're living in, i don't think any of us have lived through anything quite like this, is giving us a lesson in

what leadership is in the absence of it. when i look and read my history, i see washington in the early years of the revolutionary war face terrible adversity. nothing went right. one failure after another. yet, he kept the confidence of the troops and the country. same thing with lincoln. lincoln searched for a general who could win. defeats early in the 1icivil wa sense of despair, desire to abandon the effort. same with franklin roosevelt during world war ii. roosevelt was a steady, calm president. he trusted his generals and scientists. he conveyed that, that sense that he was the nation's father, if you will. he was going to help everybody get to where they needed. hate to be partisan, but to quote what, i think, joe biden said last night in the debate, this is bigger than any of us. that's the one thing that doesn't come through when donald trump speaks, is the sense of

humili humility, which is at the core of real leadership always. >> it is. ed, you look at the disaster that the testing rollout was. again, i have to say, joe biden easily had his best debate last night, talking about testing, how we'd handled testing. the president has been disastrous on testing. we're going to talk about the airpo airports yesterday in a second. no pre-planning for that either. it was disastrous across the united states. again, confining thousands of people in tight areas which, obviously, will spread the pandemic, as well. there you have, again, the president at the center of all of this, still not seeming to take any of this seriously. again, having his people make the right moves now, but the president's own words still giving deniers a reason to say,

what devin nunes said yesterday. go to the pubs. stop being a baby. hang out wherever you go. what the president doesn't even, ed, is that spooks the markets. this isn't about me. right? they think this is about the media, like trumpists? this isn't about me. when the president speaks that way -- i know the president. i know his failings. i know what he's incapable of. it's the markets, ed, that when they hear the president of the united states speak that way, saying we have it all under control, when he has no idea what the next three months are going to look like, the markets crash. it is exactly what they did overnight. >> so the president was clearly delighted by the fed's move yesterday to slash interest rates to zero, have $700 billion of quantity of easing, ease that bazooka. what he said shortly after the

fed did that was, we have tremendous power and control over this virus. it negated what the fed did. it indicated that the leadership was not aware of this scale and duration of this problem. something that the fed, by its actions, had just signalled it did grasp. again, very strong mixed signals there being reflected by the market reaction this morning in europe and asia. all down. dow futures sharply down. i think, you know, the thing i always relate to, and i'm sure we all do in our own way, is that that united airlines pilot, you know, who says, just a slight delay, ten minutes, we should be off and taxiing, and then half an hour later, saying, actually, it was a maintenance problem. it'll be a couple of hours. then four hours later, saying, sorry, the flight is canceled. if you give bad news early,

people trust you. >> right. >> donald trump keeps talking happy talk. >> yeah. >> he keeps getting contradicted by the people working for him. >> and by the reality. >> you know, the thing is, mika, it's something we've been say g i ing, literally saying, for three weeks. >> longer. >> give them the worst news. prepare everybody. prepare the markets. tell them how bad it is going to be. >> get in front of it. >> get in front of it, then the markets will prepare for that. they'll move on that. if you do a good job, you beat expectations, and you're awarded for it down the road. ed, just like you said, he continues to talk happy talk, and there's a string of quotes that are going to follow him for the rest of his political life, saying there's only 14 people and it'll be down to zero soon. this is going to disappear magically in april when it warms

up. >> everyone gets a test. >> anybody that wants a test gets a test. it goes on. >> no tests here. >> once again, this weekend, he talked about demoting the fed chairman. the fed chairman decides to reduce interest rates down to zero. i had complained last week that they were reduced half a point, and the markets crash because they saw that as panic. he needed to leave, the fed needed to leave something in their arsenal for when things really got bad. because things, as dr. fauci said, are still going to get worse. we have nothing left in our arsenal when you do what the fed did yesterday and reduce rates to zero. there's not much left in the arsenal for when things really get bad three, four weeks from now. >> that is true. if you sort of keep with the analogy of keeping your power to drive, look, when front lines are being overrun, you don't

want to keep the powder dry. you want to keep the powder. what the fed signalled is they'll do whatever it takes. there are things beyond going into negative interest rates. they can keep lending to small businesses, keeping credit going through the economy. what jay powell emphasized strongly yesterday is that this is a matter for fiscal policy. this has got to be congress. it's got to be strong public support for businesses that are failing, for payrolls that can't be met, for health care workers to have child care so they can continue to do the health care work. this is a fiscal question now. so i think the fed has done whatever it takes. said, now, it's your turn. that's going to require very strong sort of political signaling from trump, and he's going to have to talk to pelosi at some point. >> yes, he is. >> he's got to overcome his inhibitions on that score. >> to say the least. now, listen, as the u.s.

extended its ban on travel from europe to include the united kingdom and ireland, u.s. airports faced avovercrowding, long lines, and hours of delays, as travelers returning from europe had to undergo screenings for the coronavirus. scenes from chicago's o'hare airport, jam-packed terminals, people standing shoulder to shoulder, as officials scrambled to set up the enhanced entry screenings announced by the trump administration. >> how could they have been so ill-prepared? >> this is beyond. look at this. >> donald trump knew this was coming. he could have called out the national guard if he had to. could have done anything. >> look at this. >> once again, so ill-prepared. look how close everybody is. jam-packed in there. >> using the bathrooms. stuck for hours. this is a disaster. >> once again, the president is ill-prepared for a crisis.

>> so, according to the "washington post," officials acknowledged that 40,000 passengers returning from europe over the weekend had created chaotic conditions and strained airports, with many travelers reportedly wondering why the health checks put in place were not stricter and did not generally include temperature checks. acting tre ining director of ho security, chad wolf, said the department was aware of the long lines and asked travelers for their patience. >> why didn't they prepare for this? they knew this was coming. >> patience? illinois governor jb pritzker blasted the trump administration, asking the president to, quote, do something now. here's what the governor had to say on "meet the press." >> i got a call at about 11:00 last night, after that tweet from a white house staffer who yelled at me about the tweet. that is what i got. we're on our own out here. i wish we had leadership from washington. we're not getting it. >> so there is a health care crisis, actually, katy, in

chicago o'hare. there are health care crises at all these airports where people are jam-packed in for three, four, five hours at a time. >> 40,000. >> 40,000 people. health care crisis. the white house is ill-prepared about this, though it was the president who set up the policy. they had to know this was coming. these people are forced to do exactly what dr. fauci and the entire scientistic and medical team has been saying now for weeks. the white house has a staffer call, yelling about a tweet to a governor whose own people had to be exposed to the pandemic, standing in those contained spaces, jam-packed for four hours? white house is worried about a tweet. >> i look at the photographs, and i literally am sitting here feeling my anxiety levels rise, thinking how would you cope,

being that close to somebody? the chinese tried to shut down their early whistleblower, and it caused them a huge amount of problems. it caused people to die because they wouldn't recognize the problem. two things we have learned from the chinese experience. transparency is much better. the governor of illinois was right to complain about this. this is a huge health problem he has sitting on his doorstep, and the white house tried to shut him down. the other thing we learned from china, you take massive amounts of screening and do it super efficiently. you got on a bus in china. you entered a building in china. you walked down the street. your temperature was being taken every time you entered a supermarket. your temperature was taken, and it was done in an instant. here, they set up this policy where they knew they were going to have thousands of panicked people coming back from europe. where was the screening? what was the fast, efficient temperature testing, so you didn't have those people standing within centimeters of each other, within inches of each other? not within three feet but inches

of each other, knowing that was going to cause a problem. we have seen some of this before, where the white house announces what looks like a kind of, you know, stephen miller type policy. very big, very bold. then there is no follow-up. there is no expertise. there is no bank of talent behind that, to get the systems in place, to make sure it works properly. >> joe, just -- >> david ignatius, we look like a failed country in those moments. not a failed country, but it looks like washington, d.c. has failed. we have failed leadership in washington d.c.. our leaders don't know how to perform the most basic of functions. again, this is a policy that donald trump set up himself at a press conference last week. this is the result. these people coming back are a result of donald trump saying they needed to return to the united states and would be screened beforehand. i'm fine with that. dr. fauci said it was a good idea.

seems like a good idea to me. but there was no preparation for it whatsoever. what happened was, we're having screenings to stop people from being exposed to those with coronavirus, and here we have 40,000 people jammed together. obviously, they're people coming from the most affected continent in the world. obviously, there were people that had coronavirus there. it takes several days to show symptoms. obviously, passing that along to other people. so the president, in effect, has caused the spread of coronavirus by being ill-prepared here. who knows what the ramifications are going to be. he knew this was coming and still did nothing about it. >> joe, your hearts go out to the people when you look at those photographs, standing there hour after hour. >> stuck. >> knowing the risks. what can they do about it? they're just caught, as you say, in somebody else's poor judgment. when we think about what led to

those scenes in the parairports there was a rushed attempt, as we understand it, by the time of the president's thursday night speech, to get the elements of this policy together. to get the travel ban announcement. the european countries didn't even know this was coming. you know, in a sense, how could you prepare o'hare airport when the countries from which the people were leaving at no tie i either? it was a, let's prepare a television announcement spectacular, and it had the opposite of the desired effect. one thing that i just feel, i know we all do, is our hearts go out to the people who are caught in this. each of us can think what it'd be like to be standing in that line, just knowing your risk of terrible disease was going up minute by minute. there's nothing you can do about it.

that -- those are the people we ought to be thinking, how can we help them out of this mess? >> joe, to underscore the dangers of some of the misinformation, at the same time as the illinois governor put out the tweet, crying out for help from the white house, governor of oklahoma put out a tweet wit saying, this is what americans should be doing. then he declared a state of emergency in oklahoma. in terms of the president, the contrast, as we talked about, the president getting up in the briefing room and spouting happy talk, as david said, followed by the vice president and drach. fauci, giving more sober analysis, providing information to americans who were nervously watching, while the president, according to our reporting and others, part of what is forming this response, fueling all his rhetoric on this, which hasn't been as serious as it should be, is concerns about the markets and how that, of course, impacts his re-election. it is all about his campaign

going this fall. he does not want -- he told aides around him, he does not want this to be overblown, in his words. it negatively impacts his chances this november. >> and the stupidity and the recklessness of political leaders to say, go out to restaurants. go out to pubs, as devin nunes said. you had the governor of oklahoma saying that. then the next day, having to declare an emergency. yeah, the governor of south carolina last week saying he wasn't going to close anything. in fact, he was going to go to the st. patrick's day parade himself. then he had to announce yesterday that he was closing schools in south carolina. i mean, what is it? what is it about these republican leaders, that they think that -- they think you can shoot a virus? they think your ar-15 is going to help a virus. they think some, like, macho

display is somehow going to beat the virus? no, you can't. see, let me help you out here. you can't bully a virus, okay? you've got to out think it. you can't be stupid. taking your family out to a restaurant when the top scientists in the world are telling you to stay home and protect them. then the next day, you're made a fool of. you have to call a national emergency, so you've admitted you put your family at risk. everybody around your family at risk. in south carolina, the governor trying to act like a big shot. oh, we're not listening to the world health organization. we're going to -- people, keep going out eating, go to the pubs. i'll be going to the st. patrick's day parade myself. and then he's forced to declare an emergency. it's really -- the recklessness is unbelievable. i know people were giving really

dangerous, reckless monologues on tv, but that was last week. those were cable news people. you don't aspire to be us. you're a governor of a state, and you're responsible for the health and well-being of senior citizens whose very lives are on the line. you have got to do better. your calling is higher. you've got to do more. you can't play for the cheap seats. be an idiot and hold up an ar-15 and wave it around and say, i'd like to see somebody come take this. like a member of congress did in his own room. i don't even want to get into that. like, find other ways to symbolize your fake masculinity, all right? when it comes to this virus, think about your mother, think about your father, think about your grand fathfather, your grandmother. i see these cases in south florida that are exploding.

it is going to be senior citizens. in florida. senior citizens in arizona. senior citizens across america who are going to pay the disproportionate cost, just like the senior citizens in washington state. they're going to pay the disproportionate cost for your stupidity. you are literally, with your actions, killing senior citizens. pull back. be responsible. listen to the scientists. show some leadership. >> because we actually are all in this together. >> we're in this together. >> we're stuck with each other. still ahead on "morning joe," new york governor andrew cuomo and new york city mayor bill de blasio will be our guests. plus, former house intelligence committee council daniel goldman revealed he has tested positive for the coronavirus. he'll join the conversation via skype to explain why he believes the trump administration is shockingly unprepared to handle

the pandemic. "morning joe" is moments away. >> there's a lot of concerns with the economy here because people are scared to go out. but i will just say, one of the things you can do, if you're healthy, you and your family, it is a great time to just go out, go to a local restaurant. likely you can get in easily. let's not hurt the working people in this country that are relying on wages and tips to keep their small businesses going. >> sympathetic. >> don't run to the grocery store and buy, you know, $4,000 of food. >> cleaning off the shelves. >> go to your local pub. - [spokeswoman] meet the ninja foodi pressure cooker,

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it's our most dangerous addiction. so we took our worst vice, and turned it into the dna for a better system. we created bionic and put the word out with godaddy. what will you change? make the world you want. thank you very much, everybody. ♪ come on, come on, touch me, babe ♪ ♪ can't you see that i am not afraid ♪ ♪ what was that promise that you made ♪ ♪ why won't you tell me what she

said ♪ ♪ what was that promise that you made ♪ ♪ now i'm gonna love ya till the heavens stop the rain ♪ ♪ i'm gonna love you till the stars fall from the sky ♪ ♪ you and i >> okay, i like that. that's good. we have no symptoms whatsoever. >> wash your hands as often as you can. >> if you're around someone sick, keep away from them. ♪ touch me babe ♪ can't you see that i am not afraid ♪ ♪ what was that promise that you made ♪ >> we're finding very little problem, very little problem. now, you treat this like the flu. ♪ what was that promise that you

made ♪ >> it's going to disappear. one day, it's like a miracle, it will disappear. this is their new hoax. anybody that needs a test gets a test. it will go away. just stay calm. some of the doctors say it will wash through, it will flow through. interesting term. ♪ you and i >> what was that promise that you made indeed? the federal reserve announced yesterday -- >> that microphone -- >> so gross. >> seriously, they need to come with people in the hazmat suits and take it away. >> it was really disturbing, especially since he had been exposed -- the president, himself, had been exposed to at least two people. >> at least. >> who have been diagnosed with coronavirus. anyhow, announcing yesterday it is cutting interest rates, the fed, to zero, and will buy at least $700 billion in government and mortgage-related bonds. in a drastic effort to curb coronavirus concerns. joining us now, former treasury

official and "morning joe" economic analyst steve rattner. and senior business correspondent and msnbc anchor stephanie ruhle. good to have you both this morning. >> stephanie, we've talked about this before. the fed makes a move. this is the second time they've done it, and the markets respond not the way donald trump thinks they're going to respond, but they respond quite differently. in fact, by crashing. they had to stop overnight trading, futures trading. of course, in australia, their markets crashed by almost 10%. looks like it is going to be another tough monday. >> without a doubt. remember, like the last rate cut, this was an emergency cut. they didn't wait for the scheduled he ed meeting, and it coordinated cut. you saw the fed do this with central banks around the world. what does that tell us? this is majorly serious. whether you're talking about the president or other politicians

who are still kind of downplaying this, the federal reserve just put the wrld orld notice. that the economic impact, the spread of coronavirus and the precautionary measures we need to take, ie, lock it down, are going to be crippling for businesses. by cutting rates to zero -- >> but help me out here, stephanie. help me out here. we cut it to zero, and i'm sure jay powell is making the right move. you don't keep the powder dry when the loynn line is being ov. maybe rich people say, i'll get a house at a lower rate, another car at a lower rate. if you run a restaurant, if you have a shop in a mall, if you have any business, you can lower the interest rates as low as you want. the consumer -- like you always say, we're a consumer-driven economy. they're not going to look at lower interest rates and say, hey, you know what, i'm going to go out with my family over this

weekend and we're going to go to yellowstone. no, they're going to be at home. >> okay. yes, that's true. in a normal time, when rates get cut, and you see people go out, spend, borrow, buy a house, they're not going to do that here. you can't forget, what this does is make it easier for banks to lend. it makes it easier for businesses, big and small, to borrow. and any srt of consumer-facing business right now, they'll see their revenues tank. the cost of operating their business stayed the same. so they do need to borrow right now, and lowering rate it is a positive for them. it is not just for rich people. now, does itlouisi inglosing sh their job? no, you have to turn to congress for that. >> steve, we keep having these rate drops. at the end of the day, isn't it congress, isn't it the president? he has to get together with nancy, and aren't they the ones who really have to address this

crisis, by taking care of people who are out of work, who have to stay home because their kids aren't going to school, who own that small business? they're not going to be able to make payroll for not only the next two weeks but the next two, three months. that's where the relief needs to be directed, right? >> absolutely right. first, i'd say stephanie is also right. the fed should have done what it did. it did scare the markets because they had a meeting coming this wednesday. why are they going on sunday? it is not just lending rates. it is also liquidity in the markets. the treasury marg ikets and rep markets were seizing up. to your point, we need stimulus. look, there's almost no doubt in my mind, absent some extraordinary event, we are going to be in a very, very significant recession. will it be as bad as 2008? i don't think so. i hope not. as bad as the early '90s that elected bill clinton? very possibly, even probably at this point. business has essentially stopped

functioning. you can't solve of that with $8 billion packages out of congress. it was important stuff they did, but it is a drop in the bucket. you need a major league stimulus out of congress. you need $500 billion, something like that, to try to get money out there, try to get the economy going again. i talked to a senior senator last night. senior democratic senator last night. said, at moment, there is no appetite in congress to do that. it is viewed as a bailout. i couldn't under the logic of why we shouldn't be doing it. congress needs to act in a major way now. one last point, trump has proposed a payroll tax holiday. that is a terrible idea. it would essentially not benefit the right people in the right ways. we ned somethi need something like a rebate. not hard to dre siesign or do. we need leadership from the white house and action from congress. >> you talk about how lowering interest rates make it easier to borrow. what about the businesses already extended?

a lot of people have credit lines extended. i talked to people with global companies. i've talked to small business owners. business owners, large and small, have credit lines that they're running up against. that they are not going to be able to pay it off. are banks going to allow them to borrow more money? >> fundamentally, before this happened, our economy was in better shape than it was in 2008. we don't have the sis mystemic problems. things look cleaner. what happened now, it is almost like a national disaster, 9/11, or significantly worse than that. banks are willing to borrow. fundamentally, they feel pretty good about these businesses. what we are facing, and steve just said it, is a complete economic shutdown. it is as though the medical advice we're getting is to put our lives on pause, and it puts the economy on pause. that's where congress has to figure out, how do we account for that? is it a national holiday? is it simply writing a check to

people to get them through this time? it's something we haven't faced before. >> in terms of business, joe, there's things you can do to help business, short of saying businesses don't have money. there are things the government can do to provide credit support, probably through the banking system, particularly for small business so they can start to lend again to some of the businesses without worrying the banks themselves will necessarily take the hit. there are targeted aid programs, particularly toward small businesses, we can put in place. big businesses, you'll see big bankruptcies. you'll see companies in the oil industry going bankrupt. likely see companies in the travel and airline business going bankrupt. i personally don't see a case for the government providing aid at the moment to them because it is not an existential crisis for the country. we have a process to reorganize them. you'll see a lot of carnage and wreckage. i don't believe that the policymakers in washington -- steven mnuchin said yesterday he didn't think we were in a recession. it is the most ridiculous comment i've heard an official say, except for all the ones you've shown on your various tapes.

we are in one, and we need to deep with it. >> also, these industries that will want to be bailed out, with the exception of the airline industry, you can make the argument it is a necessary business, cruise, travel and leisure, are essential businesses. there's a lot of jobs, but are they essential businesses that need government intervention? a cruise ship left miami this weekend, and miami hotels were having pool parties. if they are not acting in the most responsible way, do they deserve a bailout? you know they're going to be asking for government support. >> no. no, they don't. >> wow. >> thank you, stephanie. we greatat greatl lly appreciat >> good point. >> this is an economic crisis like in other in our lifetime. it is certainly not 9/11. after 9/11, there was recovery. 2008, obviously, was a terrible economic crisis. we did get through that in a couple of years. but in this case -- >> this is different. >> -- business is stopping. >> yeah. >> consumerism is stopping.

people are going to be staying home. it's certainly -- expect a big announcement, i'd say, from the white house this week. i think you're going to see the united states move in the way that italy, spain, france, most other -- >> there's no choice. >> the way most other western industrialized powers are doing. if you don't, there will be a crisis that will cripple the economy for years to come. we're going to have to endure the short-term pain. small business owners who operate on the margins. entrepreneurs who operate on the margins, who are fighting to survive and make payroll every two weeks, they're going to get hammered. it is going to be ugly. they've got to get relief from washington, d.c. i will say, one of the things bernie sanders said last night, you know what? we're infusing the system with trillions of dollars for banks. that's fantastic. we've got to help our small

business owners, too, that are going to be left out to dry. when the tide goes out, they're going to be the ones, the small business owners, who are the backbone of this economy, are going to be the ones suffering the most. congress needs to do something. the president needs to do something. not just worry about friends that he eats with at mar-a-lago. he needs to worry about small business owners who are going to get hurt in this disaster. >> have to make life and death decisions. you have the low-working income mom who has to make a decision, whether to take care of the kids at home not in school, or continue to try to work where it may not be safe. this is going to get worse, and there are new guidelines that are going to be coming out. i would expect, if you look at the science and where the data is going, they will be deserve. hospitals around the country are bracing for an expected surge in coronavirus patients lik s by eg triage tents outside of emergency rooms. >> what you've been talking

about for weeks. >> outside emergency rooms, hopefully separated. adding extra beds in break rooms. even recommending plans to cancel non-emergency surgeries. hospital executives quoted by the "washington post" say the burden on the health care system in the u.s. could be crippling if the virus were to spread as fast as it has in china and italy. the latest data on a key measure of how prepared the u.s. is for the outbreak shows the united states at 2.8 hospital beds per 1,000 inhabitants. compared to 3.2 in italy and 4.3 in china. we're not ready. the department of veterans affairs reportedly is preparing to absorb the surge of coronavirus cases in the case private hospitals around the country can't cope, by offering backup beds, since the va has a surplus. in an open letter to president trump, published in the "new york times," new york state's governor andrew cuomo urged the

federal government to mobilize the u.s. military. this is what i was talking about. to help create hospital beds, asking, in part, quote, can we slow the spread of the disaster to a rate that our state health care systems can handle? the answer increasingly looks like no. what we're talking about though here is, joe, military hospitals set up outside of hospitals. so we can separate these patients, which is not being done. joining us now, "morning joe" chief medical correspondent dr. dave campbell. and infectious diseases physician. i want to get an overview, in terms of preparedness, again, the lack of testing, which i guess they say 1.9 million tests, which is not even close, coming soon. we are flying blind, are we not? >> yeah. i think that, i couldn't know, we're seeing hundreds of cases in many of the major cities in the united states.

that's not really getting the bigger picture yet. as you said, despite the fact these test kits are out there, which you're finding in a lot of state laboratories, is that human resources, other technical availability of infrastructure and machines is kind of limiting this flow. even commercial laboratories are moving toward getting super busy with the testing. so we don't yet have a sense of how big this crisis. >> you know, dr. dave, we keep talking about senior citizens who are so at risk and act as if younger people are not at risk. but i remember the whistleblower in china, the first person who got in trouble for warning about the spread of the coronavirus there, fairly young doctor died. young health care providers in china died. young health care providers in italy are dying. are we understating the threat to younger people as this virus

spreads across america? >> joe, first, my prayers go out to the victims. we are not understating the risk. the problem is, in young people in china, for example, there were three doctors 20 to 30 years of age who died. the message that young people in the united states have is that because their risk of death is low, they can relatively ignore this problem. they're not recognizing that by becoming infected, which they can, they become vectors. they becompasskocome passengert the virus to older family members and others. young people realize, yes, they can become very sick, but it's rare, but perhaps more importantly, they can pass this disease to their loved ones. they can become infected even before they are symptomatic.

>> you know, jonathan lemire, the idea that somehow young people are infallible when it comes to this disease, obviously, we're learning day by day that that's not the case. tommy vetore tweeted yesterday that a good friend of his who was really healthy, athlete in college, served in the united states military got the coronavirus and started experiencing violent symptoms. this is not just a disease for the elderly, though it is, of course, the elderly who take the brunt of the disease's impact. >> certainly, you would hope these younger people would get the message and start staying home. i mean, instagram over the weekend was pretty dire in terms of people still going out to the bars and clubs. exposing themselves and potentially putting others at risk. doctor, my question for you is this. i mean, schools are out pretty much everywhere now. people are home. parents are home. we know the impact of this virus on the elderly.

let's say you're a person, 30s, 40s, 50s, seasonably good health, and you start to feel sick. you have a cough, a fever. how important is it to be tested? should you be going to the doctor? should you be going to the emergency room? should you be trying to do it over the phone instead? what steps would you give someone who is concerned, they don't have underlying health issues, think they're reasonably okay, but they're afraid they're getting sick. what should they do? >> i want to start by saying we are seeing young people get sick enough to at least be hospitalized. there's still a concern for everyone, that you don't want to get this disease if you can avoid it. not just for the sake of others but your own sake. those who get sick, the main thing is, what people are not realizing is that in major u.s. cities, we're seeing hundreds of cases. what that's hiding is that, on top of that, you have double, triple that number of people who are suspects, who are coming in with similar symptoms, who may have another respiratory virus,

and that is overwhelming the system already. it is stretching hospitals across the country. for people who are in relatively good health, the main thing you can do is call your provider before actually going to seek care. they'll advise you whether you should stay at home or come in for testing. the other aspect of this is when should you actually go to the emergency room? the good rule of thumb is what you'd do for any other disease. if influenza, what would drive you to the emergency room? fever not breaking, shortness of breath, confusing, chest pain, anything that seems alarming brings you to the emergency room. short of that, contacting your medical provider by the phone is probably the best strategy right now. >> dr. dave, the u.s. surgeon general urging hospitals to cancel elective surgeries. what's the reasoning behind that, and why are people still going to regular ers and mixing with the general hospital population, when they have

symptoms? >> mika, that's two questions, but they are both related. the surgeon general announced on saturday, in follow-up to the american college of surgeons, that we should halt elective surgery starting now in the united states. that also includes things like colonoscopies and routine tests. the reason is that using up the resources, which includes people, equipment, and space, is what happens when you have an elective operation. the risk of having the spread of the disease through the hospital, operations are not pretty. when there is a lot of air flow and a lot of manipulation of the airway, everybody that's in an operating room realizes, there's a lot of spray in an operating room. so we also use a lot of gowns and gloves and masks. if a hospital worker, doctor,

anesthesiologist, nurse, gets sick, they'll be taken out of the pool of available people. we're going to use up a lot of equipment, and that person who got sick might be in the hospital. that's the space problem. people, equipment, and space. >> dr. dave campbell and dr. bhadelia, thank you, both. we'll be hearing from you both soon. >> greatly appreciate you being here. so, ed, what do you expect over the course of the next few days, not only here but across europe and the world? >> so i think we are going to start to see more and more pressure for something we haven't really been hearing much talk of. which is global action. coordinated action through the g-20, through the united nations security counsel. the world must hang together, otherwise, it this assuredly hang separately. this is going to be a very

difficult bullet for president trump to bite. i don't know whether he will bite it. but as we've seen, this virus is indiscriminate, affects the south, north, east, west. the need for cross-border cooperation, for sharing science, sharing research on vaccines, for sharing resources, respirators, ventilators, the components, active ingredients of important drugs, is going to become, i think, a very compelling need on all our parts. it is a little disturbing to see president trump, you know, attempt to poach german scientists. that's not the kind of signal, i think, we want to be seeing at the moment. >> no, i don't think so. there's a -- david ignatius, tl there is an article in "politico" that talks about the incompetence pandemic.

it is interesting that we find ourselves in a position, facing the worst pandemic this globe probably since 1918/1919. we'll have to see how it plays out. yet, we have leaders that are so desperately overmatched with the times they are. populous leaders of the united states, britain, across europe, who know how to enrage their oppone opponents. in the united states, we call it, quote, owning the libs. know how to do that. they just don't know how to work the levers of government. they don't know how to work with people who aren't in their party. they don't know how to bring together a bipartisan consensus in a time of crisis. we are, in effect, at war. there is just an incompetence pandemic, as "politico" says, on both sides of the atlantic.

>> incompetence pandemic is a scary, new addition to our vocabula vocabulary. part of what concerns me is that it's not just at the very top. we watched the footage of president trump. the mistakes made by the cdc in this whole process, of trying to get rapid testing out to the public, so that coronavirus could be tested and we'd have a better sense of the map of this pandemic, that also is worrying. i guess what i'd say, joe, is that in wartime, and this does now feel like a war, people discover virtues and strengths they at no tididn't know they h. when i talk to my dad who is 99, god bless him, trying to keep him healthy, he always says the same thing about world war ii. we didn't know what we could do until we were out there. we suddenly, you know, had responsibilities, frightening events around us, and we hadn't

anticipated. we found new strengths. i think that's going to happen in the country. already see it. one more thing. every time i go to the store, i still want to buy things, i'm always struck by the supermarket clerks who are still there working. they're dealing with 1,000 people a day. you know, heaven knows what they're carrying with them. they're on the job because that's their job, to serve the public. if we could all take that basic idea, we'd be better off. >> david and ed, thank you both for being on this morning. up next, we'll talk live to someone who has tested positive for the coronavirus. former federal prosecutor and house impeachment attorney daniel goldman joins us via skype to discuss all he had to do to get tested. as the number of cases surge in new york, governor andrew cuomo and mayor bill de blasio will be our guests. "morning joe" is back in 90 seconds. - [spokeswoman] meet the ninja foodi pressure cooker, the best of pressure cooking and air frying now in one pot, and with tendercrisp technology,

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if you remember sars, that affected gdp, travel-related effects. have you been briefed by the cdc? >> i have. >> are there words about a pandemic at this point? >> no, not at all. we have it totally under control. it is one person coming in from china. we have it under control. it's going to be just fine. >> just so hard to watch. >> again, this is -- he repeats. we have it totally under

control. he said that january the 22nd. after that, he said, we have 14, 15 cases in the united states. pretty soon, that's going to be down to zero. he said, when april comes, it is going to get warm, and it is going to magically disappear. he said, you're going to see it disappear like magic. this continues. again, every time he said this -- and i know he watches our show -- so, mr. president, you're spooking the markets. you're hurting yourself. >> you're hurting us, hurting americans. >> you're undermining your position when you say this. you spook the markets because you reveal that you really don't know what's going on. jonathan lemire, he said the same thing last night. he had a press conference last night, and he got up there and said, it's completely under control. we've got it under control. walked off. then he had dr. fauci and everybody else up there, all of

his scientists, all of his doctors, all of his health care experts, saying, no, in fact, this is not under control. this is going to get much worse. >> in a crisis, both the markets and citizens require consistency from their public officials. that's not what we're getting right now. the president is so out of step with the rest of his administration. he is consistently downplaying the severity of this, in an effort not to spook the markets. he's had the opposite effect. in his personal behavior, this week, we know last weekend at mar-a-lago he was exposed to two people who tested positive for the coronavirus. he stood next to at least one of them for a photograph. for most of the week, he refused to get tested. he would not do so. in fact, the white house doctor late, i believe, thursday night, put out a letter saying he didn't need to. only to have the president the next day finally acknowledge that he did, and the white house really saying that he tested negative. the white house is taking steps, finally, to show they are taking

this seriously. everyone coming in and out of the building, as of today, are getting their temperature taken. reporters and staffers alike. there is some sense from the administration, and dr. fauci has been the face of this, and the vice president, to his credit, has been out there every day, too, answering questions. they're taking this seriously. the president himself though, still not. the last two days, as he popped into the briefing room for surprise appearances during the coronavirus task force briefings, both times, he spoke for a few minutes, struck an optimistic tone, said we'll get through this, and both times, walked off without taking any questions. >> mika, the markets crashed overnight. the futures crashed. they had to stop trading because it got to its 5%, negative 5%. the trading stopped in australia. the markets crashed by almost 10%. it looks like it is going to be another dark monday for people. there are billions and billions

of dollars that are going to be lost. the president needs, we'll say it again, he just needs to be realistic. he needs to tell the truth to the american people. the markets will respect him more for it. all of those people that are still going out because the president says it's okay to go out, they'll actually stay at home, protect themselves, protect their families, and in this case, most importantly, protect senior citizens who will be exposed to illnesses through third parties, if they continue listening to the president and going out. >> here's where things stand right now. the u.s. is under a national state of emergency. the cdc has now updated its guidance, urging against any gatherings of 50 people or more for the next eight weeks. as joe mentioned, stock futures are crashing once again, despite emergency action from the federal reserve. slashing interest rates to zero. the senate is poised to take up a sweeping bill, passed by the house, that includes free

testing, extended sick leave, and $1 billion in food aid. meanwhile, several states and cities around the nation have shut down restaurants and bars to sit-in guests, and doing delivery only. california, illinois, and new york city among them. the city of new york also announced last night that it is closing schools. also closing, nightclubs, movie theaters, and other entertainment venues. mgm says it is suspending all operations in las vegas casinos and hotels until further notice. georgia and louisiana postponed their primary elections. new york state is considering the same. the governor of california has called on more than 5 million senior citizens in his state, and those with underlying health conditions, to isolate themselves. this as the number of confirmed cases continues to surge. closing in on 3,600. west virginia is the only state without a confirmed case.

as florida saw a huge spike this weekend, a reporter from the "orlando sentinel," tweeted these photos from disney world yesterday. what in the world? what are you thinking? people packed into magic kingdom for a final time last night before the park closed over the coronavirus. it's closed today. >> we were looking -- >> this is yesterday. >> last night, we were looking at pictures from airports of people who had no other choice. these people, all of those people packed paid a lot of money to get in there. my god. it's -- okay. >> this is why messaging needs to be clear and based on the science, and it needs to be from the president. a lot of reasons there. also this. take a look at this. all these people crammed together, tens of thousands. the result of the trump administration's hastily arranged airport screenings for travelers from europe.

scores of people crammed together in the types of crowds we've been told to avoid. by the way, what happens if they screen in a way that makes them need to be separated? where are they put? how did this work? doesn't seem like it worked very well. that brings us to europe. the uk and ireland were added to the president's travel ban over the weekend. italy, spain, and france recorded their highest death tolls for a single day. france, 29. spain, 97. and italy, a staggering 368 deaths. italy also recorded its most number of new cases in a day, 3,590 new cases in one 24-hour period. spain and france have now joined italy in banning people from leaving their homes for non-essential purposes. joining us now via skype is daniel goldman. he has been on the show many times as a former assistant u.s. attorney for the southern district of new york. most recently, was the

democratic counsel for the health intelligence committee. this morning, he joins us in a very different role, having tested positive for coronavirus. dan, i guess, first question, of course, how are you feeling? how are you doing? thank you so much for sharing with us this morning. >> well, thanks for having me on. i'm feeling a lot better. it was about three days of what felt like a kind of medium-strength flu. fever, a headache, a cough. i think there's some mystery that the coronavirus is this plague, that if you get it, you automatically are, you know, on a ventilator and locked down. obviously, the concern is with vulnerable people, that does happen. but with people sort of my age, demographic and health, i think my experience is probably relatively typical. i'm on the mend, i'm not quite 100%. my wife, unfortunately, now has pretty serious symptoms, as well, like i had. we're hunkered down, just weathering it out. thanking our lucky stars that

our health is what it is, and we can fight this thing. >> so, dan, just tell us the process and how you got tested and then diagnosed. was that, you know, pretty immediate? and is your wife tested, the people around you? how is that working? >> it was very difficult. it was very frustrating. it -- i went public with it sort of in real time, not because i knew i had coronavirus, but because there's a lot of misperceptions out there that tests were readily available to anyone who wants them. that was simply not the case. i had symptoms. i had not been in contact with anyone that i knew to be positive for coronavirus. basically, that meant i could not get tested. so i got tested for the flu, which has similar symptoms, and was negative. i got a full viral panel to see if it was anything else. that was negative. once that came back, i was told

by the new york presbyterian hospital that i had to go home and self-quarantine because my symptoms were not bad enough to be admitted into the hospital. unless you're admitted, you don't get a test. the crazy thing, mika, is they sent me home, but because i had no known contact with anyone with coronavirus, they told me that i needed to self-quarantine, but that the rest of my family should go on acting as if they are normal. anyone i had come into contact with could continue to go around and live their lives normally. i finally just wouldn't take no for an answer. i drove at 5:0 in t0 in the mor to connecticut to get a test that came back positive over the weekend. now, my wife, who obviously came into contact with a known coronavirus positive, that's me, she and my three kids got tested this weekend. it still takes, you know, two,

three days to get the tests back. that's where we are right now. >> waiting for results on your wife and your children. dan, back up, then we'll move forward on how the regs st of y family is figuring this out. you're walking around in er getting the flu tests? where did you get the initial tests? because you have coronavirus. clearly, you're walking around with it in medical facilities? >> i went to the emergency room with the symptoms, and already having got a negative flu test. they put me in a one room, secluded. they basically told me they could do nothing for me, no matter whether i had it or not. then they stuck me in the hallway bed with a mask on for about six hours, to wait for my viral panel. it is a way to get a chest x-ray. i was in the hallway with people coming by. i had a mask on, but it's an incredibly unsanitary -- and the

testing situation, i don't blame the hospital. they were overloaded and overrun with people. they don't have the tests that they need. the medical professionals i dealt with at the hospital were incredibly frustrated that they did not have the number of tests they would use. they had to ration them in this way. that is the fundamental problem. anything you want to hear, and that's my frustration. donald trump can keep saying that, anybody who wants a test can get it. i am living proof that is not the case. that is the biggest problem we have. the result is, the laundry list of things you just listed that needs to be shut down because we don't have enough tests to actually see if people have it. we have to take these incredibly draconian measures to keep people away from each other. >> you did your best, i'm sure, to self-isolate when you thought you might have it. but you're lying in the hallway for six hours. because they couldn't just give

you a test, and you could have found out six hours ago, before that, that you had the coronavirus, and then you could have gone home and acted accordingly. again, everybody is sort of whistling past the graveyard. let me ask you, you're in new york, can't get the test, you're in the hospital for hour after hour. you said you ended up at 5:00 a.m. driving up to connecticut and getting the test. why could you get the test in connecticut but couldn't get the test in new york? >> there was a curb-side clinic in connecticut. i think it's grenich docs ct. hats off to then. they got, somehow, enough tests where they didn't have to ration them in the same way. i called them on thursday of last week. goit got an appointment 6:00 a.m. on

friday horning. i went to do it. this is after being rebuffed by urgent care facilities in new york, hospitals in new york, because i didn't meet the criteria the new york department of health had said, given the number of tests they have, which is insufficient. >> we have a doctor friend who actually thought he had the coronavirus and went through the same thing as you did. ended up that a close friend of his did test positive ultimately. he had to go home for five days. ended up he had the regular flu. he had to go home and self-isolate for five days. his entire office had to shut down. all his workers, of course, had to go home and not work for the five days. all because we didn't have these tests which, as joe biden said last night, we could have gotten if the president had just agreed to get the tests from the world health organization. let me ask you, daniel, do you have any idea how you picked up

the coronavirus? >> i traveled to london last weekend. friday, march 6th, i got my first symptoms, the day i returned, tuesday, march 10th. you know, i will say this, i did not take as seriously the coronavirus as i probably should have. i probably should not have made that trip. but it felt to me like it's the flu. e everybody can get it. i'm relatively healthy. you know, when i see photos that you just showed, of mass people at disney world, i'm a person who will, you know, explain that i didn't take it seriously enough, but everybody really needs to take this seriously. anybody can get it anywhere. whenever we hear about the limited number of cases, we just don't know. there's way insufficient testing to know how many people have it. there are -- i wouldn't say millions, but there are thousands and thousands of people walking around america

right now who have coronavirus and who don't know it. the idea that you would go and mingle with large groups of people is really silly at this point. >> yeah. daniel, we're thinking about you. >> absolutely. >> and your wife and entire family. our thoughts and prayers are with you. certainly, we are hoping for a speedy recoffvery. >> thank you. >> thank you so much. >> good to see you guys again. >> let's bring in professor at princeton university. chief white house correspondent for the "new york times," peter baker. and correspondent for pbs news hour. and katty kay is still with us, as well. >> peter baker, there are all these clips. there are all these clips of the president in january going, oh, we just have one person from china here. it is nothing. we have it completely under control. then, of course, the president says it is 14 or 15 people. pretty soon it'll be down to zero. then the president says it'll go

away in april. then he says it'll go away magically, just like that. the president even on friday, in this press conference that was meant to reassure the markets, is still talking li ining like completely under control. last night in his press conference, or late yesterday afternoon, he says it is under control. >> it is going to pass through. >> we have it under control. it is going to just pass right through. then it was left to dr. fauci and the other health and medical profession professionals, scientists behind him, after the president waltzed off the podium, to say, no, actually, we don't have this under control. things are going to get much worse. can you take us inside the white house and talk about the -- is there frustration by the fact that this president is still encouraging people, by his words, to go to disney world, still encouraging people to go out to pubs, still encouraging

people to cram into small, confined spaces, by saying, we've got it under control, no need to worry? >> i think they have struggled from the beginning, obviously, to find that balance between reassurance and keeping the public calm and providing realistic and helpful information, right? this president, who normally is a commanding figure, who normally dominates a stage, who normally controls the conversation, has been kind of a bystander, while federal agencies and governors and ministers and people of faith and sports commissioners and you name it, have been making decisions about american life without guidance from the top. without the president sort of setting a direction and saying, okay, here's what i am telling americans they should think and do at this point, given the information we have. instead, as you say, he has tried to reassure people. the first thing he talked about yesterday, of course, was the federal reserve's decision to cut the rate to zero.

we've already seen this morning, at least with the implied future of the markets. the markets didn't take that as a reassurance that everybody had perhaps hoped it would. in fact, the issue is the facts on the ground problem, not, you know, a federal rates problem. the issue at the moment is that american businesses are shutting down for the foreseeable future. more money from the fed can only do so much until people feel faith that the health care system is going to handle the problem. that's where the president's challenge has been and one that he has yet to find, i think, the right formula for. >> so, yamiche, you had an exchange with the president on friday that made a lot of news. first is kristen welker's question that set up your follow-up question. let's take a look. >> dr. fauci said earlier this week that the lag in testing was, in fact, a failing. do you take responsibility for that? and when can you guarantee that every single american who needs a test will be able to have a test? what's the date of that?

>> yeah. no, i don't take responsibility at all because we were given a set of circumstances. we were given rules, regulations, and specifications from a different time. wasn't meant for this kind of an event, with the kind of numbers we're talking about. >> you said that you don't take responsibility, but you did disbdi disband the white house pandemic office. the officials left the administration abruptly. what responsibility do you take to that? and the officials that worked in the office said that the white house lost valuable time because that office wasn't disbanded. what do you make of that? >> well, i think it is a nasty question. what we've done is -- and tony has said numerous times that we saved thousands of lives because of the quick closing. when you say me, i didn't do it. we have a group of people. >> your administration. >> i could -- my administration, but i could perhaps ask tony

about that. i don't know anything about it. >> you know, you wonders what's wrong with him. a lot of people, yamiche, think he is blatantly racist and sexist when he says things like, nas that is a nasty question. he always seems to have a problem with you. it is incredible and worth pointing out. but to your point and your very good question, he did shut down that office. he announced it a while back himself. we were left flat-footed, without the proper scientists in charge, correct? >> that's right. the white house, under president obama, had this office that was to deal specifically with pandemics. they were going to be monitoring the entire world, to look out for things like polio outbreaks or sars. the trump administration, in 2018, disbanded that office. officials left the administration abruptly. those people were not replaced. then the president continued the go on as if it was okay. this happened under john bolton, his national security adviser. the president is now saying he

had no idea why that happened, and didn't have any idea or any responsibility for that happening. of course, again, this was his administration. mika, what this moment really calls for is credibility and leadership and compassion. unfortunately, a lot of people think president trump isn't showing that. you have compassion in the fact that there are people that are so scared, that are crying, that want to go visit their neighbors and can't do that. you have a president who starts his last press conference talking about the fed cutting rates. you have a president who is saying everything is under control. we're going to get through this. his top health officials are saying, look, we do not have this under control. we don't know when this is going to peak. we're worried that people are going out there and not taking this as seriously as they need to. then you have local governments saying we need direction from the white house. we need to know, should we be closing bars? should we be closing schools? the president has not yet told them. the leadership vacuum is leaving state officials to do whatever they can. to get back to the original

point, what you have here is a president who is really left flat-footed and was struggling to deal with the coronavirus outbreak, and really find the compassion and credibility ne needed in this moment. >> he couldn't do it. it is interesting, joe biden last night, his first words were that his thoughts and his prayers went out to those who were suffering from the coronavirus. and who lost their life from the coronavirus. those are words for the president of the united states. still hasn't uttered because he is incapable of thinking about, i guess, if you judge him by his own words and actions -- >> 100%. >> -- about how this is impacting him politically. you look at the president's performance. there was another thing from friday, other than the horrid response to yamiche, i guess predictable response to yamiche, that really stuck out. that's when the president turned harry truman's words, the buck stops here, on its head. basically said, i'm not

responsible for anything. of course, the whole world knows donald trump is responsible for our lack of testing. responsible for the national crisis that we're in right now. without this testing, we're not able to track who has coronavirus and who doesn't. that, obviously, allows the spread of it and prevents scientists and math matism math from doing the spread. looks like we're headed in the direction of italy. what is remarkable, donald trump could have accepted the testing kits from the world health organization. they tried to give him testing kits. he refused. here we are still. we just had daniel goldman on. he knew he had the coronavirus, had traveled back from london, could not get the coronavirus test, was lying in a hospital hallway for six hours because he

couldn't get the test. these are the nightmares. these sound like stories from the 1918 pandemic. here we are, a century later in 2020, and donald trump is still fumbling around on this crisis. still telling people he's in complete control. still telling people there's nothing to worry about. still telling people that he bears no responsibility for all of the failures of the past three to four weeks. >> joe, as i was thinking about that press conference on friday, it just reminded me of the, you know, stories around nero, fiddling while parts of rome was burning. instead of fiddling or listening to music, donald trump is watching television. what we do know is this, is that the office of the presidency reveals the character of whomever occupies that space. what we're seeing over and over again are these character defects. what struck me, and what has struck me about donald trump's

response, and all the things you said i agree with completely, is he has no sense of compassion, as yamiche said, or empathy for the most vulnerable among us. he can't talk about the folks working in the gig economy. all the millions of folks who don't have health care. because he has been, in some ways, trying to dismantle the obamacare. part of what we're seeing is not only the selfishness of donald trump, not only his capacity to kind of skip over the facts of the matter. he seems to not have compassion and empathy for those who are the least of these. because he just simply comes into view. it's tragic for the leader of this country. >> as yamiche pointed out, friday in the press conference, he and his administration had been cutting the very agencies

that would be able to respond to this pandemic right now, and respond most quickly. they've been gutted, some offices shut down. others had their budget slashes. >> the president cut our ability to response. joining us, robinson meyer, here with the reporting that america isn't testing for the most alarming coronavirus cases. robinson, we just heard a pretty stark case from daniel goldman, who had clear symptoms and was turned away. does it get worse than that? we understand, like a lot of people, you're joining us via skype in order to social distance. explain to us what you mean about the starkest cases here. >> yeah, absolutely. in this case, daniel goldman's experience was very indicative. i'm so glad he preceded me on the show. thank you for having me, by the way. in many states right now, it is

exactly the kind of set of rules around who can get a covid test, a coronavirus test that he experien experienced. if you've been out of the country recently, even if you traveled do memesticdomesticall get a test. if you know someone who has a lab-confirmsed case of covid, yu can get a test. if you don't know someone who had another positive, it is often very, very difficult to get a test. what that means is that we're not looking, we're not seeing the kind of coronavirus cases that are the most alarming. if coronavirus is spreading in a city or in a state amongst strangers for the first time, then we won't be able to test for it, basically, until it shows up in an older person or someone who lives in a nursing home, someone who needs to be hospitalized. at which point, usually under the rules, they'll be able to

get a test. >> robinson, it is jonathan lemire. question for you is simply this, we heard the president on friday say that they're ramping up the test kits that are going to be available. he said there would soon be 5 million. he quickly dismissed that, saying we're not going to need that much. first, i want to get your take. don't we need far more than 5 million? but does there come a point, and we heard this from public officials here in new york city, that if this becomes so widespread, it is less important to be tested. it is all about the treatment. can you walk us through when that line, when we cross that line? >> yeah, exactly. there are really two kind of places to hit here. first of all, the more tests we have, the better. in many parts of the country right now, we're really not testing enough people to understand how widespread the disease is. right now, for instance, in washington, d.c., among both the public and the private labs, we've tested 120 people for the coronavirus. we assume this is widespread for many reasons in d.c., but we

really don't know. the second one is, yes, there gets to be a point where the hospitals will be probably, essenti essentially, in places where the disease is quite widespread, filling up with folks who have trademark covid symptoms. at that point, it becomes less important to test everyone because we will kind of assume most people have it. that is the point that new york city has reached. we don't -- until we get more tests, we can't really know that on a city-by-city basis. also, hospitals can't prepare for that influx if they don't know how widespread the disease is. and there is a point where we do need still many tests in those places. health care workers, if they have flu or cold symptoms, need to know whether they, themselves, are positive for the coronavirus and need to stop working and self-quarantine, or whether they have the flu and cold, at which point they can take precautions and keep treating patients. >> the "atlantic" magazine's

robinson meyer, thank you so much for your reporting. >> really is unbelievable. k katty kay, we live in a country that has a $21 trillion gdp. this past year, we had a federal budget that donald trump signed for $4.5 trillion. the biggest budget in u.s. history. the most spending by the federal government in u.s. history. yet, we've heard all morning, and we've known for some time now, we're having to ration pandemic tests. in the middle of a pandemic that is sweeping across europe, sweeping across the world. we're rationing tests despite the fact we're a $21 trillion economy. >> yeah. on several levels, this pandemic has revealed a real weakness in the united states. you don't have the number of beds, even that italy has.

we don't have the number of respirators that other countries have. we have done nothing like the amount of testing that italy, south korea, japan, china have done on their citizens. i think for donald trump, it is almost as sort of existential point, that he finds it so hard to think that donald trump's america could learn anything from other countries. when the world health organization, a global body, those global bodies that he hates, comes along and says, here's our testing. you are going to need this. his instinct is, in donald trump's america, i can do it best and don't need help from other countries. i think it'll prove to be a real failing in america's ability to deal with this. it could be what means we end up looking like italy, where you need a pass to be out in the streets at the moment. police will stop you and check your paperwork to see if you have a valid reason for being in the streets. doctors are making decisions about whether someone is over 70, they'll just have to die

because they don't have the ventilators. all of the projections are that we are 10 to 12 days away from that. i think if the president, earlier on, had been able to say, we need help. we don't have everything right. this is not perfect. we are not necessarily the best when it comes to this, then a little bit more humility in learning from other countries may have stopped america getting to this point. at the moment, we're heading the way of italy. >> and, katty, i mean, you talk about italy having more beds per citizen than we do. it really is shocking. we spend more money on health care per citizen than any country in the world and, jyet, we don't have the vaccines, of course, and won't for some time, but we don't even have testing or the hospital beds. italy has more hospital beds per person than does, of course, the united states. it's really frightening.

peter baker, what are the chances the united states are going to follow the path of france and spain and italy and other industrialized powers, basically shut the country down a couple weeks and tell citizens to self-quarantine? >> great question. it looks like we are a week or so behind, as katty said, and those things are already starting to happen in piecemeal fashion, rather than a national fashion. we're a bigger country, obviously. not every place in europe has done exactly what spain and france and italy have done. just as america physically might not require a national similar rule across the board. but it is hard to know at this point. at this point, every single day, so much changes in our understanding. it was just a week ago, right, that the president was at mar-a-lago with the president of brazil. they had a party for his son's girlfriend.

everything seemed fine. within days, you begin to see one result after another. the sports leagues shutting down, businesses shutting down, churches and places of worship, and so on. i think, predicting ahead, it is hard to do at this point, but it feels we're heading that direction. one of the key moments will come today when the president gets on the phone with the other leaders of the g-7. the question is, is there a coordinated response? is there something the international community can do together? and will the united states play a lead role in that, as we have traditionally in the past? up until now, of course, president trump's interactions with other countries has been to shut the borders. maybe it was helpful, in terms of limiting the travel flow of some people infected, but it hasn't produced a universal or global or, you know, comprehensive response. that's the -- that's on the table today for the conference call. we'll see how that goes. >> peter, do you know, is the president, the white house, is congress doing anything to get us moving in the direction where

we increase the number of hospital beds, we make sure we have a sufficient amount of ventilators? i know we're talking about the va, but do you have any information about the united states trying to expand its capacity? >> i think one of the things the national emergency that the president declared on friday does is to trigger some of that response that is planned over the years. you ciofsee fema, obviously, ane military have the capacity to set up field hospitals that are contingency plans that have been set up over the years. how advanced they were, i'm not sure. military told members not to travel. it's a precursor in the steps you have laid out usually for the more aggressive response that could be just a few days away. you know the apparatus of government is starting to move in that direction. the apparatus of the state, in effect. the question is how ready they really are. one thing to have this in theory, on paper.

now, they're going to be tested in reality. can they put into place the kind of things people have been talking about for years? might be necessary. something we've never seenpeter thank you for your reporting. thanks for being on. ahead on "morning joe," the president announces a plan for google to help the government respond. >> that's great. >> to the coronavirus. >> he said they had a website up, right? getting the website up. >> couldn't even get that right. >> but google, he said google is going to take care of everything. >> we'll explain. >> are they not going to help us? >> not what he said. >> google. >> they're going to try. >> he said -- >> he made this announcement that wasn't true. >> google was going to help. >> in the middle of a crisis, he has riffing. also, we booked nbc's hans nichols. he was delayed, as the white house took the temperature of everyone entering the grounds. hans describes that, and the other measures, under way now,

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there's a very contagious, there's a very contagious virus. it is incredible. but it is something that we have tremendous control of. >> let's go to the white house and nbc news correspondent hans nichols. the president saying we have control over this situation, hans. are there any in the white house that are concerned about the extremely mixed messaging? >> there are always concerns about the way the president handles any sort of crisis because the president is likely to just get out in front or behind and get on a different page than the officials. i'll just give you one example of that as it relates to this particular crisis. remember on friday, even the president changed his opinion in

the briefing on whether or not he'd get tested. first, he said, there's no need. then he came out and said, probably likely, most likely, we'd be taking the test. just before midnight, there is an official memo from the white house physician saying that there's no test indicated for the president. then it turned out the president came to the briefing on saturday and said, actually, no, i did take the test. i did it last night. that memo was already out of date. later on, on saturday, they indicated the president actually tested negative for it. but it gives you an indication, and peter was talking about how, just a week ago, there was a party at mar-a-lago. it gives you an indication of just the velocity with which this crisis is moving and the changing response. late last night, there was a statement from the national security adviser's twitter feed that there's not going to be a national quarantine. they wanted to shoot down rumors of any national lockdown, italy style. we have a briefing at 10:30

today they say they'll have additional guidelines. then the vice president said there might be a second briefing. they are trying to react to this in real time. as we all know, this is moving very quickly. the president has clearly been contradicted by his own staff and by his own doctor on what his own plans are. if there is confusion at that level, it makes you wonder where else it will be. you guys mentioned, i was delayed coming in. they are now testing reporters before -- and all officials walking through the northwest gates here, putting that temperature meter on the forehead. making sure that we all have a low temperature. >> nbc's hans nichols, thank you very much. >> thank you, hans. >> president trump announced on friday that the administration has put together a plan to have drive-through testing available with the help of google. here's the president on friday addressing that plan. >> we've been in discussions with pharmacies and retailers to

make drive-through tests available in the critical locations identified by public health professionals. the goal is for individuals to be able to drive up and be swabbed without having to leave your car. i want to thank google. google is helping to develop a website. it is going to be very quickly done. unlike websites of the past. to determine whether a test is warranted and to facilitate testing at a nearby, convenient location. we have many, many locations behind this, by the way. google has 1 rk,700 engineers working on this right now. they've made tremendous progress. our overriding goal is to stop the spread of the virus and to help all americans who have been impacted by this. again, we don't want everybody taking this test. it is totally unnecessary. this will pass. this will pass through, and

we're going to be even stronger for it. >> this will pass through. >> oh, my lord. >> it'll go away. so the president of the united states in a press conference on friday, meant to calm fears, said google is helping develop a website to facilitate testing. talked about the thousands of google engineering who were doing that. >> he was reading it. several people involved in the proposed plan said the administration was actually overstating the scope of it. on multiple fronts. one state health official said the announcement surprised all of us. and it was bizarre. pointing out that many of the 6,000 public health service officers are deployed elsewhere and could not be readily shifted. >> so that was a lie. >> opposite to what the president was saying. >> it's a lie, okay? >> and shortly after the news conference, a google communications account tweeted that the plan to build the website is nowhere near close,

and that they are in the early stages of development. >> also lying. >> i mean, this is incredible. >> co-founder and editor at large. she's an msnbc contributor. kara swisher, fill us in. >> google can build this, and he was speaking before anything had happened. that was the problem. he acted like it was complete, and it certainly wasn't. the 1,700 engineers were googlers who signed up to help in a dcrisis. this has happened before at google. it was a small thing they were doing with california, actually, to try to get people to figure out what sites they can go to get tested. it certainly wasn't anywhere near completion, or even at the beginning of this kind of process of development. >> kara, i'm just -- this is the president reading off of a paper. >> right. >> that supposedly is prepared

by people in the white house. >> and they made it up. >> this is absolutely not the care. it's possible -- i see you're saying it is possible. >> sure. >> that's great. a lot of things are possible. but in the time of a crisis, the president is announcing something at a major tech company being involved, and that is not happening. >> i think there were discussions. i think jared kushner was having discussions with people from a division of google. it is not really google. it is a division of alphabet. so they were talking about this idea, and it is, again, a great idea. they'd be able to screen people quickly, to get to the right place. again, google could probably make this really quickly. they do this every day. they do this kind of computing. this is a difficult thing to make, but they can do it. they have the staff to do so. certainly have the will to do so. so it was an idea that was still in the early stages. i think the issue -- now, google said they're going to do it. they're going to try to roll it out. the stuff they've gotten up there is pretty crude, that

they've put up there, and it is certainly not what is being described. again, it's a great idea. it can be done quickly. it just wasn't checked with google or alphabet, actually, before it happened. >> yeah. >> i don't know what to say. it just was like early.early. just the way the drive-up stuff was early. there's no ability to do that for the most part. so again, a good idea, but needs to be deployed just like at the airports. a good idea, needs to be deployed. that's really the problem here. >> all right. we've got the governor of new york. kara swisher, thank you very much. we have to move on to that. just incredible, though. like you can't say anything around the president because he might just riff it at a press conference like blurt it out before it's true or before it even comes together as a possibility. >> it really is unbelievable. let's bring in governor cuomo. thank you for being with us. you certainly have been on the forefront of governors across america responsible, pushing for, asking for help from the federal government, and also understanding you're going to

have to take matter into your own hands because it's sort of like katrina, i was on the ground in katrina for the first two weeks before the federal government did anything. anybody waiting for the government to respond to katrina kept waiting. it seems like we're at the same place, here, 15 years later, but this time it's not a hurricane. it's a pandemic. >> you're 100% right, joe. i said that this is the hurricane katrina version of a public health situation. and we are taking matters into our own hands, frankly. we are doing drive-throughs. we didn't wait for the federal government, and we're doing everything we can do. but, but you and i were both in the federal government. we understand the capacity. there has been no country that has handled this, joe, without a national response. and we have been behind on it from day one. i'm not giving up. there are things we need the federal government to do.

you look at today, the news, all these patchwork acts by these different states. it makes no sense for me to take an action. i close bars and then people drive to new jersey or connecticut, my neighboring states. you need a federalized response. especially on the looming crisis. and the looming crisis is that curve that everybody talks about is not a curve. it is a wave. and the wave is going to break on the hospital system. there is no projection that says our hospital system can handle this. we need the army corps of engineers in here now. retrofitting old buildings, dormitories, et cetera, for more hospital capacity. that's what china did, that's what south korea did, that's what italy didn't do, and i have one of the largest state governments in the nation, but i can't build hospital beds in thee weeks.

i need the army corps of engineers. >> well, and also, governor, don't you need these people separated from the rest of the hospital population? you have an op-ed out this morning which is a call to president trump to mobilize the military to help fight coronavirus. i mean, military hospitals being set up around the country would do a lot to stop the clusters. inside the medical community and among the people on the front lines of helping the sick. >> that is exactly right. and look, they say life has options. we don't have any options. we know the health care system will become overwhelmed. that's how people die. i only have 3,000 intensive care unit beds in the state of new york. about 80% are already occupied. so i only have about 600 beds available. i already have 60 people in those beds.

this is a disaster waiting to happen. we know it. the only alternative is to build, develop more beds, retrofit. you're not going to build anything new. get some of the people out of the hospitals into those new medical facilities. and do the best we can. it's still not going to be good, but just to be wasting day after day after day, this is nonsensical, and it cannot happen without federal resources, period. >> now, you know, you talked about how we were both in the federal government before. a guy who was speaker of the house, i think it's safe to say, had an up and down relationship with, was newt gingrich. of course, i haven't agreed with much of what he said over the past three years since donald trump has been elected president of the united states, but it's interesting that finding newt gingrich is writing an up ed saying i'm in italy, the

coronavirus is deadly serious and america better wake up. i'm finding more and more republicans who have blindly defended the president are waking up to the reality that we can't bluff, we can't bs our way out of this pandemic. are you finding that as well in new york? are you finding that republicans are more willing to work with you despite the fact that the president is still sending reckless mixed signals? >> yeah, i think what's happening, joe, is first of all, people are frightened. they're truly frightened. they're frightened for themselves, frightened for their families. and that overrides partisan loyalty, right. it's about them now. it's not about loyalty to their political party. secondly, it's unavoidable on the facts. people know what's coming. you look at that projection, dr. fauci puts up that curve every day. you know that curve is going to

crash, and we can't handle it. and also, i think people, the president is trying to show leadership, and he's trying to show leadership by calming people. and that is a responsibility of leadership. but you don't calm people unless you tell them the truth. you're not going to deceive people. you're not going to say it's all going to be fine, take two aspirin and call me in the morning. so they know it's not working. and it's actually making things worse. and when the federal government then is not doing its role and you have these broadcasts of every city, every state doing all these different things, people see pandemonium. and it is frightening. you put pandemonium on top of a pandemic, it is a bad situation. >> yeah. katty kay is with us in washington. she has a question for you. >> governor, you have seen the pictures from europe of

countries like italy and spain on near total lockdown. do you think we're going to get to that stage here in the united states? do you think you're going to get to that stage in new york city? in rome at the moment, you cannot go out in the streets unless you have a special pass that lets you go out in the streets. police will stop you and check your paperwork. is that where a state like new york is heading? >> yeah, i hope not, and i don't believe so. and i don't even believe you could do that in this society. but i'm going to be announcing more actions today. i closed the schools yesterday. making sure there's child care for health care workers because, again, this all comes back to hospital capacity. some of these states have closed schools that made no capacity for child care and now you see health care workers and nurses not showing up. so closing the schools, closing bars, closing restaurants, closing mass gatherings. we'll be doing more of that

because right now, the numbers are continuing to spike. so you have to ratchet down on the density control if you're going to get those numbers anywhere near where you can manage them in the hospital system. but for me, my priority is turning to the hospital system. because that's where we're going to have a major crisis, and it's weeks away. >> governor andrew cuomo, thank you very much. appreciate it. appreciate your leadership. >> coming up, the mayor of new york city, bill de blasio, is standing by. he joins us straight ahead. "morning joe" is back in two minutes. ng now in one pot, and with tendercrisp technology, you can cook foods that are crispy on the outside and juicy on the inside. the ninja foodi pressure cooker, the pressure cooker that crisps.

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the rest of the world hears you. >> yeah, no, i don't take responsibility at all. >> god. okay. some select moments in presidential history for you there. >> don't take responsibility. >> welcome back to "morning joe." >> you know, you watch the democratic debate last night, which we haven't talked about. >> we need to get to that. joe biden committed to choosing a woman for vice president, also for supreme court. kind of exciting. >> we'll get to that. one thing that joe biden was talking about and i'm sure bernie sanders agrees as well, we could have gotten the test kits from the world health organization. this entire crisis would look completely different if we had done that. we may not have even had to declare a national emergency if we had taken the world health organization test kits. our scientists, our mathematicians are the smartest, the best and the brightest among us, could have begun mapping out where the coronavirus was. and i think we probably -- it could have remained an epidemic in the united states and not a pandemic.

i don't know. maybe we'll never know, but we do know this, that we're in the crisis we're in right now, and it's reached the level that it's reached because you still have people like dannian goldman who was on our show earlier today, who had coronavirus, they didn't have a test they could give him, so he was lying in the hall. with the coronavirus, in a hall of a hospital, for six hours. >> exposing health care workers. >> because they didn't have a test. i don't know who you think this is on if you support donald trump. i don't know who you're going to blame this on. but you know what, they didn't call barack obama and say, hey, man, would you like the world health organization test kits? no, you see, you should check your calendar. barack obama hasn't been president for about three and a half years now. they asked donald trump. and donald trump was the one who said no, we don't want the test kits from the world health organization.

if we had them, then we would know right now whether you and your loved ones had coronavirus. again, a lot of senior citizens who were in seattle, who were in arizona, who were in the state of florida, the sunshine state, wouldn't be concerned right now about whether they have it or not. they would know. we're actually whistling in the dark now because of decisions donald trump made. so when he says the responsibility is not with me. it's because of this or that or the other, or look behind the tree at somebody over there or it's barack obama. no, no. he was the one. donald trump was the one. his administration said we don't want coronavirus test kits from the world health organization. and that has made all the difference. >> so still with us, we have white house reporter for the associated press, jonathan lemire. washington anchor for bbc world news america, katty kay, and professor at princeton university, eddie glaude jr.

joining the conversation, the host of msnbc's politics nation and president of the national action network, reverend al sharpton, and the mayor of new york city, bill de blasio. >> i have to say, reverend al's show yesterday was really great. >> amazing. >> it's always great, but man, he spoke truth to power yesterday, mika. >> mr. mayor, i would like to start with you. as joe pointed out, we have all been pointing out, we're behind the eight ball on testing. are we looking at the science, just listening to the data and understanding how this virus spreads and surges and spikes, especially in congested areas, are we going to be in the same situation as it pertained to separate medical facilities to treat these cases? are we going to have clusters of people exposing health care workers across the country because there aren't military hospitals being set up? >> mika, that's what i fear. right now, we need a national solution. this should be a reality where

the united states is put on a war footing, where the federal government mobilizes all the resources necessary, and it begins with testing. i agree with you, testing to make sure health care workers are safe, to focus on our most vulnerable individuals, to make sure we can protect them. ultimately, i would love to see a broader testing approach as was done in south korea as a strategic tool to help eventually end this epidemic. but right now, here's what i'm most concerned about, exactly where you were going, the hospitals. we're going to have to set up emergency icus in hospitals not only all over new york city, all over america. we're going to need the united states military to come in with their substantial logistical and medical capacity. we're going to need the supply chain nationalized in some form right now. there's no effort to make sure that ventilators, surgical masks, even down to hand sanitizer, all these products should be put on a 24/7

production cycle. whatever factories anywhere can make them should be cranking them out. they should be distributed for federal priority as you would in a war. >> i know there's some effort with ventilators, although the white house will not release and top health officials will not release numbers. that worries me at this point since we're getting such mixed messages and mixed information during these daily briefings. but we have been talking about separate medical units for weeks and weeks and weeks. and let's just be clear here. this is not being done right now. so as these numbers spike, we're going to have this virus spread across the medical community. there's no way to contain it inside a hospital, is there? >> and mika, no, it's very dangerous. in fact, the thing we have to make sure is our health care workers are safe, so that they can take care of everyone else, obviously, and we're going to lose -- look, some health care workers will be infected. we have to quickly make sure they're treated so they can come

back to action. but here's what we're saying about exactly what you're talkitalk talking about, ventilators. we need real numbers, testing capacity, real numbers. and how about the fact that the united states to the best of my knowledge, the united states military right now is still engaged in building the border walls. take them off that and put them on coronavirus, for god's sakes. knngs that is option right now should be canceled and there should be a full national mobilization to protect people. if we don't have the medical facilities, the ventilators and supplies, you're going to be losing thousands and thousands of lives that could have been saved. >> mr. mayor, you decided yesterday to close down new york city schools. you tried to keep them open as long as you could, but why did you make the final decision that you made? >> joe, it's sheerly continuing to analyze with our health officials the trajectory of this disease. and the role that social interaction plays in the disease. we also needed to figure out if there was some way to come up with alternatives for our kids

to give them some kind of distance learning to make sure that the kids particularly of health care workers, transit workers, and first responders, if they needed a physical location, they could do that. i spoke to dr. fauci last night and said what do you think is the next most important thing to do after closing schools. he said bars, restaurants, cafes. get them to take out and pick-up basis. we ordered that last night. we'll have to do a lot more to try to constantly reduce the spread while simultaneously building up that medical and logistical capacity real quick. again, we have a few weeks to get on a full war footing or we're just going to have our hospitals in a situation where they can't save lives that could have been saved otherwise. >> you know, one of the things, joe, i think in adding to what the mayor said, is there must be a coordinated effort with those stakeholders in the communities around the country. one of the things i think that i

commend mayor de blasio on is he dealt with the social reality that in many cities, including new york, we're still dealing with the tale of two cities. so when you're dealing with testing and you're dealing with how we're going to remedy these situations, that's much different in underserved communities than others. which is why you need the military intervention to equalize how the testing is going to be and how those stakeholders in the community can work along to make sure that happens. i think mr. mayor, you and i talked right before you made the announcement about your convening community leaders and others so we make sure that those who are outside of where there are a lat of health facilities and hospitals can be served because we don't know whether there's a low count in some areas or not because they're not where it's easy for them to be counted. >> the tests are only available for the privileged, and let's face it, that's health care in

america right now. you have some emergency surgery you need, you have the red carpet if you happen to have money and a lot of people wait a long time. same with testing. clearly right now, the testing is not being distributed sufficiently, according to pure medical priority and there's nowhere near the supply. so of course, privileged people are going to have first dibs in a lot of cases. you're exactly right. the more you create a massive testing supply, the more you bring in the military and other forces that create that equalization, the better off we are in living up to our values and insuring everyone is saved across the board regardless of zip code. >> a quick follow-up. that alsoworks in how you close the schools, which is one of the reasons some of us were reluctant to see you do that, because in some areas schools are child care, a free breakfast and free lunch, and there are other calculations to what is going to happen now to the children. i'm concerned that they go to school, but i'm also concerned now, are they going to be in the streets?

what's going to happen with police and young youth interaction. all of these things must be considered and factored in. >> i would say that's for most kids. most kids in our city cools, that's a million plus kids, two meals a day were crucial. the safe, positive environment was crucial. that's why i was exceedingly hesitant to close. and now, at least i know we have some alternatives for them now, but it's still, we have to be clear that closing schools, you put a lot of teenagers particularly out there without the kind of supervision you would like. maybe in this case we're going to see more and more of their parents and other older adults home because there's less and less work. that might balance the ekwashz. >> those that can be home. >> a lot of people have no choice but to work, but workplaces are reducing all the time. we have to be clear, to every reaction, equal and opposite reaction. we're providing meals all week at the schools, pick-up meals, breakfast and lunch. we're going to have to create

feeding stations of some type going forward. we're doing home deliveries for seniors. closing down senior center programming but using senior centers as kitchens in effect, dispensaries to get meals out to seniors at their home. there's a lot of pieces we have to alter. look, the great depression and the new deal are very instructive here. i'm not saying bread lines, but let's be clear. we're getting close to a reality where the government has to insure that the food supply, that it is not only available but it's equitably distributed. we're going to have to get into a heavy intervention in people's economic lives because a whole lot of people are losing their livelihood by the hour and they need a continuity of economic support or their families are going to collapse in other ways. >> two questions. first on the schools and i'm a new york city school parent. they're closed until at least april 20th but you left open the possibility of being closed until the end of the school

year. why out of step with what other schools are doing? >> we're looking at the trajectory right now. look, i would love nothing more than to reopen on april 20, which is right after our spring break, but i fear this crisis is going to start to crescendo through april, may, before it ever gets better. so the classic it's going to get a lot worse before it gets better. i think that's a hard atmosphere to reopen schools in. if we are lucky, if all things break in our favor, it's possible. but i wanted to, you know, get people acclimated to a new reality, that this is very well going to take us through the school year and maybe beyond because it's not just the sheer track of the disease. it's all the other dislocation we have to deal with. >> a second question. you also announced restaurants and bars are closing. >> except for take-out and pick-up. >> over the weekend, it was clear new yorkers were not social distancing, but what kind of steps do you take to provide

relief. st. patrick's day is tomorrow. they're going to be closed. a lot of places bank on that day to carry a lot of profits going forward. how can you help them out? >> and the workers. >> of course. the city is getting grants and loans and things for small businesses. but that's a small piece. that's where we need a massive federal relief program. the stimulus bill which we pray will be voted on, is a helpful step. i have talked to senator schumer about this, who is public about the fact there needs to be another stimulus immediately after, and let's use the new deal. the one crisis that is going to mirror -- we have the historical playbook, and this, if you want to know what this whole thing is going to play out as, one part the great recession we went through a few years ago, one part the great depression, one part the 1918 flu epidemic. those are the three models we can use to tell us what to do, and it's going to take massive direct relief to americans right down to the fact, we have to replace paychecks.

we have to re-create economic capacity because people are going to be without -- if you don't have money, you can't pay the rent, you can't buy food, you can't buy medicine. we have to understand this is a pure war footing. right down to rationing if you need it, but anything short of national leadership, and forget the president, very bluntly, because he obviously does not know how to do this. he should empower the anthony faucis of the world and the military leadership who do know how to do things to take over the situation and create a national model where all resources are distributed to where the need is greatest. our brothers and sisters in washington state, they're going through the hardest problem in many ways. they should get all the ventilators and material they need. but no one is creating in washington that kind of prioritization of resources nor are they guaranteeing the resources are produced so they're readily available to be distributed where the need is greatest. >> well, you know, eddie, the thing to always remember is that

we don't know what the future is going to look like. and we don't know, this could be like past pandemics. it could be like the great recession. but it's actions we take that determine how things are going to end up. i always kept a sign up in my congressional office. a best way to predict the future is to shape the future. we just have to be aggressive enough not only in new york city but across the country. and eddie, i just wonder how we can be that aggressive to make sure, as dr. fauci said, like, the greatest thing that they could ever say is that we overreacted, because that means we took the steps necessary to avoid this looking like 1918, 1919. but how do we do that when we have a president who constantly says this is going to magically go away, pass right through. there's nothing to worry about. we're in complete control. >> that's a very difficult question, but i think it involves a couple things. one, we need to put donald trump

aside for the moment. we need to put our partisanship aside for the moment and politics aside for the moment and think about the national will, the health of the country itself, and begin to engage in a kind of intelligent response to the issues in front of us, to the crisis in front of us. that intelligent response -- >> but eddie, you saw those pictures from disney world last night. people were crammed in to disney world last night. people were crammed into bars. a lot of those people, a lot of my friends emailing me that support donald trump saying oh, your media people are still overblowing it. i'm still seeing tweets by national figures who are trying to kiss up to donald trump saying oh, come on. this is no worse than the common cold. more people have died from the flu than have died from this. donald trump is still sending out the dog whistles, i guess you would call it, that this is all a plot to take him down. >> you know, and i get this on my twitter feed all the time,

that whenever we liken this to hurricane katrina and its threat to the presidency that we want people to die in order to get trump out of the office and the like. look, we have to figure out a way to inundate the american public with the information we need to understand the level of the seriousness of the crisis we need. it seems to me, we need to have ticker tapes underneath giving us the relevant information every five minutes on the hour, we need to have updates with regards to the crisis. but i do want to say this, that in the middle of this moment, the contradictions of american society the folks who are living in the most precarious circumstances, the underbelly of america, will be revealed. it seems to me in this moment, we have to talk about health care, infrastructure, and the like, but how do we emphasize the most vulnerable in this moment? i'm thinking about contract workers, i'm thinking about the service economy, who will be affected by the workers in the service economy will be affected by your order yesterday. i'm thinking about folks in the

gig economy, about folks in the shadows. all the homeless people around new york city. how do you emphasize, how do we respond to them in this moment? >> franklin delano roosevelt in that moment in history created something literally unheard of, the federal government funded work directly. you had millions of people who got a job because the federal government created whole new types of work creating national parks, roads, bridges, whatever it was. that had never been done, not even close, a year or two earlier, it was unheard of. it was radical, it was even unthinkable. that kind of audacity is needed here, but the problem is, with a virus, it's not like you can create work and congregate people, so it's bluntly about money. it's about putting money in people's hands to keep the economy solvent, to keep people's lives together. so those gig workers who are more and more of our economy, they need direct relief. there's nothing wrong with it. they need a check from the federal government to keep them

going. or else you're going to see a new kind of dislocation. it is going to be very much about the tale of two cities, to begin with, if we don't get it right, but even a lot of folks who at that moment would consider themselves middle class or working class or stable, their lives are going to collapse if there's not money flowing directly into their hands. the only place that can come from is the federal government, or else you're going to see this. if they don't have money, they won't be able to pay the rent, won't be able to afford food, they won't be able to afford medicine, so let's remember. you can take this virus and then amplify a health care crisis if people can't get to the other health care they need. there's plenty of other conditions and challenges that people have with their health right now. if they can't get basic medicines, you're talking about a much greater health care crisis. if we don't put money in people's hands, we're going to literally undermine the very fabric of this society. >> mayor bill de blasio, thank

you very much. we hope to have you back on soon to keep us posted on what's going on. and still ahead on "morning joe," coronavirus was the lead topic at last night's democratic debate. what joe biden and bernie sanders said they would do if this crisis happened on their watch. we'll be right back. you wouldn't accept an incomplete job from anyone else. so why accept it from your allergy pills? flonase relieves your worst symptoms which most pills don't. get all-in-one allergy relief for 24 hours, with flonase.

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. first of all, i have to take care of those who in fact are exposed or likely to be exposed to the virus. and that means we have to do testing. we have to get the testing kits up and ready. i would have the world health organization, i would take advantage of the test kits they have available to us, even though the president says a million or more are coming. let's just get all the tests we can done as quickly as we can. secondly, i would make sure that every state in the union had at least ten places where they had drive-through testing arrangements. i would also at this point deal with the need to begin to plan for the need for additional hospital beds. we have that capacity in the department of defense as well as

with the fema. and they can set up 100-bed, 500-bed hospitals and tents quickly. we have to deal with the economic fallout quickly. that means making sure that people who lose their job, can't get a paycheck, can't pay their mortgage are able to pay it and pay it now and do it now. small businesses be able to borrow interest-free loans. >> first thing we have got to do, whether or not i'm president, is to shut this president up right now, because he's undermining the doctors and the scientists who are trying to help the american people. it's unacceptable for him to be blabbering with unfactual information, which is confusing the general public. this is an unprecedented moment in american history. now, i obviously believe in medicare for all. i will fight for that as president. but right now, in this emergency, i want every person in this country to understand that when you get sick, you go to the doctor. when you get sick, if you have the virus, that will be paid for. do not worry about the cost

right now because we're in the middle of a national emergency. second of all, we have to make sure that our hospitals have the ventilators they need, have the ic units they need. right now, we have a lack of medical personnel. and i worry very much that if there is a peak, whether we have the capability of dealing with hundreds of thousands of people who may be in hospitals. so we need unprecedented action right now to deal with the unprecedented crisis. and bottom line from an economic point of view, what we have got to say to the american people, if you lose your job, you will be made whole. >> with all due respect to medicare for all, you have a single-payer system in italy. it doesn't work there. it has nothing to do with medicare for all. that would not solve the problem at all. you can take care of that right now by making sure that no one has to pay for treatment, period, because of the crisis. no one has to pay for whatever drugs are needed, period, because of the crisis. no one has to pay for hospitalization because of the

crisis. period. that is a national emergency, and that's how it's handled. it is not working in italy right now, and they have a single-payer system. >> that was a bit of a surreal debate last night. went on about an hour too long, in my humble opinion. but at the same time, i thought, rev, both candidates turned in good performances. >> i would agree they both put in pretty good performances. there were no knockouts. though i think biden might have won on points. what i really feel is that bernie sanders had an opportunity to really push a forward moving agenda forward for progressives rather than looking like two men arguing about a world series game 50 years ago that they disagreed on. it got too much into that minutia. the other thing i was surprised bernie missed at is when joe biden committed to putting a

black woman on the supreme court and a woman as a running mate, and bernie sanders kind of equivocated on would he do a woman and never made a commitment to blacks at all. here's where he's been weak in terms of getting black voter support. he never mentioned what he would do in terms of appointing a black or assembling a black at all, which is shocking giving his record and giving nina turner and dr. cornel west have been out there for him. it was a missed opportunity, especially in the backdrop of the moral outrage of the president that had come out earlier in the day gloating about how the fed had gone down and not even given some empathy to people that were suffering because their loved ones died because of coronavirus or they had been diagnosed as that. they had the opportunity to come as those that were moral and centered and had human feelings.

>> yeah, it really was. there were some missed opportunities there. i thought you're right, the defining moment of that debate last night was when joe biden said he would pick a woman as vice presidential candidate, and bernie sanders demured, did not commit to it. but katty, at some point, it just seemed so disconnected from the realities that every american is facing. when bernie sanders said, oh, you said this in 1995 on the senate floor. you voted this way in 1996. and joe biden would come back and say, yeah, you voted this way in 1997. well, then you said this in -- it was bernie sanders versus the joe biden of the 1990s. and it seemed oddly out of place with the very real crisis we're facing in 2020. >> yeah, in some ways the debate

was good. there was no audience, which i think helped it. it was more serious. can we do -- i agree with you, let's make them one hour, two hours. that was just way too long. but that thing of looking backwards, i feel a missed opportunity was for one of those men to punch forward and say, this coronavirus could very well still be with us next winter. do you want donald trump still to be running it? that's your choice. this is urgent. and it's going to carry on being urgent. you make the choice about whether you want the missteps we have had or whether you want my plan coming forward in november. but look at november. that's the choice. it's still going to be with us. >> right, and eddie, i found time and time again on the campaign trail, people don't care about the past. they don't even care about your past. they don't even care about your bio. they care about the future. they want to know what you're going to do for them in the future. all of this obsession over what

was said back in the 1990s is just not -- it's not having any impact on voters. >> you know, joe, i think you're absolutely right. i think the sanders campaign made a tactical mistake. they thought they had to contrast sanders from biden. they had to make that contrast hard. i think people know the difference between the two. whether you believe what biden was saying about his role with the paris accord, whether you believe his position with regards to bankruptcy bill. all that, they know the difference. what bernie sanders needed to do last night was to show that biden's response to the crisis we currently face is too small. he had to convince american voters to take the risk on him. he didn't do that. so biden held serve. as a result, i don't think anything changed as a result of last night's debate. >> i think, mika, we shouldn't overstate just how surreal the scene was last night. there was no audience. the podiums were six feet apart. the two men didn't shake hands. they tapped elbows at the beginning. it's because the coronavirus is

all that anyone is talking about right now, the backdrop to everything. i don't think either man necessarily put forward a huge sort of plan. i think both, of course, send off a more reassuring presence than donald trump, but it's not clear as others have been saying that they put forth a real vision as to how their administration could handle it going forward. i also just wonder how much this debate even breaks through. joe biden has a pretty commanding lead in delegates right now. this is not something that people really talk about. people talk about the virus and how it's affecting their day-to-day lives. therefore, biden provided the one breakout moment if you will by pledging to take a female vice president and also name an african-american woman to the supreme court. that's the moment people are going to talk about. therefore, that's a victory for him and not the real -- bernie sanders at this point is such an underdog in this race, he needed to be the one to sort of have a commanding victory, create the

headlines, and i don't think that happened. >> rev, final question. we were saying, you and i both said after last week when some people were trying to push bernie sanders out of the race, just give him time. be patient. let's make sure the party doesn't tear apart. but i have to ask, if joe biden runs up another massive victory tomorrow, and distances himself even more from bernie sanders, isn't it time in the middle of a pandemic with donald trump behaving as recklessly as he is, isn't it time for the democratic party to come together? and just to have one single voice against donald trump? >> given the crisis that we're in now, we are in a different place than we were a week or two ago when you and i discussed this here on the air. i think that it is really a challenge to bernie sanders that if the next round goes the way it's projected, will he stand up and say given these times we

need to be united? this may disappoint some of our followers but i have to be as big as the moment we're in. we're in a different moment. and i think that real leadership is making tough decisions in tough times, even when it may be against your own ambitions. and i think i lay that at his door. democratic party shouldn't do it. no one should force it. i think bernie needs to have a meeting with bernie if the next few primaries go the same way. if they're different, he has a different calculation. but if it goes that way, he needs to have a meeting with bernie and decide whether i'm going to be bigger than my own ambitions and that of those around me. >> yeah. >> all right, coming up, hospitals struggle to prepare for an expected surge in patients. with talk of possibly having to ration beds and ventilators. we'll talk to a doctor on the front lines of this crisis straight ahead. >> and as we go to break, we

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i had symptoms. i had not been in contact with anyone who i knew to be positive for coronavirus. and that basically, that meant i could not get tested. so i got tested for the flu and was negative. i got a full viral panel to see if it was anything else. that was negative. once that came back, i was told by the new york presbyterian hospital i had to go home and

self-quarantine because my symptoms were not bad enough to be admitted into the hospital. i finally just wouldn't take no for an answer, and i drove at 5:00 in the morning to connecticut to get a test that came back positive. >> that was daniel goldman earlier on "morning joe," discussing with us his experience before testing positive for the coronavirus. joining us now, dr. omar latif, the ceo of rush university medical center, a large hospital in chicago, which is on the front lines of battling the coronavirus. doctor, thank you for being on our show. how is your hospital in terms of being prepared for this? do you have everything you need? >> thank you for having me. i think our hospital has been working very diligently over the last two weeks in terms of preparing, learning from lessons in other countries in the world and other health care systems. we developed a unique approach of trying to flip our hospital

so that we have a forward triage area where we can really isolate patients with suspected infections. put them in a special area in our hospital, both in the emergency room and then a unique area of the hospital that we're walling off to the rest of the system that can take care of just coronavirus patients. so to the extent that i can tell you that we recognize the importance of isolation, insuring that we have the right number of beds, insuring that we're working with the city and state, which have been amazing, to get the number of supplies we need. we feel right now that we're prepared, but we're only prepared for numbers we're currently seeing, and we are anxious as the rest of the country is, for the potential to overwhelm the system. >> doctor, would it be a relief to you if the government was setting up military hospitals, specific coronavirus care centers? >> i think in the end, having the right number of beds and the right number of icu beds available for patients in this

country will be related to the number of people that continue to get infected. so it will absolutely be a relief if we get to numbers that overwhelm our system. where i am cautiously optimistic is the ability of the united states of america to clamp down and contain and mitigate the increasing volume or the surge of infection numbers we're seeing. to the extent that that's possible, our health care system is remarkable in this country, and we will be able to adapt to an extent. but certainly, if our numbers continue to increase and we don't contain and as a society we don't mitigate the course of this spread, we won't have enough beds and we will need extra beds. >> katty kay. >> dr. lateef, what's the timeframe for you for understanding whether your optimism that we can mitigate those new infections is borne out. are you looking, if we speak to

you in four, five days time and the numbers are still going up, will you say we have lost control of that moment when we could have brought the numbers down? >> i think at the end of the day, no one will critique us as a nation if we overprepare. we're hearing this from national experts, local experts. i think that time is today. i think the time today is to prepare regardless of where the numbers may be. to use predictive analytics and the knowledge from what's happened to other countries and say the numbers are going to overwhelm the system, so let us prepare our health care system locally, nationally, to take larger numbers and create the number of beds to offset this increase. so i would say the time is actually now, regardless of what the numbers are going to be to prepare for the worst case scenario. history will look back on this and say if we have too many beds, so what. if we didn't have enough beds, people could actually die. >> doctor, how are we making sure that people in underserved

areas of chicago, underserved areas around the domain you work, are actually served and tested and included in what you're trying to achieve there? >> so, rush university medical center is open to our community. we believe -- we serve the west side of chicago. we have many initiatives that include community activities. our doors are open to those people that come in, to everybody in our community. we built a forward triage area just to care for people. and anybody who comes in is going to be treated the same way. we believe strongly in equity in care. and that will flow through in the way we do our daily business along with our coronavirus approach. >> doctor, thank you very much for coming on the show this morning. good luck, as we all work through this together. up next, while the president insists his administration has tremendous control, "the washington post" reports the

administration's struggle to mitigate the coronavirus outbreak has been marked by infighting and blame shifting, misinformation and missteps. and a slow recognition of danger. we'll dig into what's driving the white house response next. and this news, as we go to break, the pentagon informed congressional lawmakers on friday that there are currently no coronavirus tests available for troops in afghanistan. coalition troops have no access to tests, but if they have symptoms or believe they are at risk, they are able to report to sick call and receive on-base medical care, which includes a screening and a medical diagnosis. if they are suspected of carrying coronavirus, doctors on the base will send samples to testing facilities in germany. ♪

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these people, because i know knog about these people. >> i don't know anything about david duke or what you're talking about with white supremacy or white supremacists. >> i know nothing about wikileaks. i don't know anything about it. you say we did it. i don't know anything about it. >> it's fascinating now little donald trump claims to know when it comes to things like retweeting anti-immigrant hate videos or his own administration's dismantling of the nsc's pandemic unit. >> every one of those "i don't know anything about" comments are all disproven by video, which shows that he does know about david duke. he does no about the klan. >> and he did dismantle the pandemic unit. "the washington post" is out with new reporting on the administration's struggle to mitigate the coronavirus outbreak. a response marred by infighting and blame shifting and missteps and a slow recognition of

danger. the report describes warring factions which have wrestled for control internally and for approval from a president who has been preoccupied with the beating his image is taking. joining us now is one of the co-authors of that piece, white house reporter for "the washington post" and an msnbc contributor, ashley parker. she joins us by phone, part of social distancing for a lot of reasons. ashley, what we've been seeing in a lot of the reporting is that jared kushner is being brought in to help coordinate some of this. what is his expertise, and what do you know about the infighting in the white house that perhaps could be leading to misinformation? >> sure. so jared kushner, he was actually asked by vice president pence's chief of staff to help because they needed to focus the full resources of the white house on this issue because it's worth noting jared kushner has

absolutely zero expertise in infectious disease and very little experience in marshalling the full force of the federal bureaucracy behind the cause. so he came in, even some of the people who were often critics of him, did give him some credit and say he cold called a lot of these ceos. he was the reason they were able to arrange that rose garden press conference. but there's also a lot of frustrations. what they rolled out on friday was half baked. it wasn't ready. that google website they boasted about, google said it's not going to be ready -- it's just in testing. they're only doing sort of a trial run in the bay area. when you heard them talk about it at the press conference, it sounded like they had ready to go google maps pandemic. that was another challenge. they said there would be testing places all over, but a lot of these companies, these walmarts and local officials, they saw

that they don't really have the direction of when or where or how exactly this is going to work. so there are some steps forward, but they are halting and stutter steps. and part of that is because the white house is incredibly behind on the testing. they are scrambling to -- from those earlier missteps and you have all of these power centers. hhs and cdc. you have one outgoing acting chief of staff, one incoming chief of staff, you have jared kushner. you have larry kudlow, mnuchin negotiating on the hill and the people we talked to said it reminded them of the early days of this administration where people are appearing in the oval office, a half dozen or more sort of competing in front of the president, performing, as it were, and he's making a decision based on a gut or a whim or his news. >> wow. okay. really appreciate it. "the washington post's" ashley parker. thank you very much. we'll be looking at your reporting.

joining us now, former white house director of communications, founder of investment firm skybridge, anthony scaramucci. >> we can talk about what's going on inside the white house. you know a lot of the players in there right now. let's talk about what's happening on wall street. obviously, the president got what he finally wanted from the fed which is reducing the interest rates about as low as you can reduce them. and yet we still have a run. australia last night lost about 10% of their market value. asia also routed. europe routed. and it looks like that's going to be happening to the united states markets as well. wall street set up for a very grim open. why do you think the fed cut the dramatic fed action yesterday is having no impact on the markets this morning? >> i think, joe, good morning, but i think the fed has had a major impact on the markets.

this would be way worse if they didn't make that dramatic sunday night cut, and why is that? because you literally have set a pause button on the global economy for 3 to 6 months. and as you know, many people in the united states and globally are living paycheck to paycheck or if you're in a small business, you're living revenue day to revenue day, and a result of which, when you step back and analyze the economy. forget about the market for a second, there are many businesses and many families that won't be able to sustain that. the next thing that the market knows and people are starting to figure this out now is that donald trump is the buyers. at the end of the day he's affected and replicated through the executive branch, and he's destroyed the crisis management elements of the executive branch that we need right now. not only here in the united states but globally. so the real tragedy of all of this, if the federal reserve can only do so much to help the

markets, you're going to need fiscal stimulus here and literally handing out free money to people to help them afford their rent, help them pay their waiters and waitresses in their closed restaurants. and again, it's a national strategy born from one person but you have remember to, the president's staff is afraid of him. and so they don't like dealing with them and they're trying to make something that's very insane, which is president trump, sound sane. and so this is the danger that we're dealing with right now. but the market does know, joe, that donald trump is actually the virus and he's replicated throughout the executive branch, and as more or less decapitated their ability to handle this crisis. >> you've become obviously a very sharp critic of the president. but you were his communications director. if you were in that role now, what would you be advising this west wing on communications strategy, the crisis is here, the virus is here. how would you counsel them to communicating -- not just the

markets but to the american people. >> it's very simple. the first thing is have a group intervention with the president and explain to him what he is doing in terms of telling people we've got it under control and this litany of 18 or 20,000 lies at this point. they've got to isolate him. he almost needs to go into a verbal communication quarantine to help out the rest of the nation. second step you have to do is listen to dr. fauci. we likely need a 14 to 21-day quarantine of all nonessential services in the united states. if you listen to any of the people that really understand this problem, directionally, we'll probably save the excess capacity issues we're going to have in the hospital. so, to me, step one, quarantine the president. get him off of twitter. get him away from a television camera and then, step two, bring people in like dr. fauci to explain what's going on and take immediate and aggressive action here.

you have to overcompensate for the mistakes that have been made, but we need to do it immediately. >> do you think pence will run, given his forward looking voice? do you think he's going to run afoul with donald trump? >> i think that's the big problem. they all know that the president is the only star in the donald trump musical. the spotlight is only on one person. when anybody else takes that spotlight and vice president pence is doing a very good job, in terms of communicating, working super hard. the president won't like that. he did that to rex tillerson. somebody like rex tillerson's prestige, president trump's self-hatred would force him to throw someone in the volcano. mike pence could end up in the president's volcano as well. >> anthony scaramuccscaramucci, for being on. stephanie ruhle picks up the coverage now. it's monday, march 16th.

and there's a lot happening this morning. daily life in america is grinding to a halt as local officials, schools and businesses pull every lever they can to slow the spread of the coronavirus. as of this morning, there are more than 3,500 cases across the country. that is double what it was on friday. at least 67 people have died and cases have now been reported in nearly every state, even alaska. the cdc is urging people to cancel any event that would include more than 50 people for the next eight weeks. that includes church services, weddings, conferences, any big group event. it's on there. restaurants, bars and movie theaters have also been ordered to be closed in several parts of the united states. in public schools, and at least 33 states, have been shut down. impacting more than 32 million students. some officials suggesting they might not go back to school this academic year. even with all of this